


What You Do Afterwards: Season Three

by myheadsgonenumb



Series: What You Do Afterwards AU [3]
Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: Allen Francis Doyle Lives, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Betrayal, Fix-It, Gen, Jealousy, Love Triangles, Romance, Sorry!, Team Dynamics are the Core of the Story, Team Friendships - Freeform, Team as Family, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:54:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 60
Words: 238,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29024568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myheadsgonenumb/pseuds/myheadsgonenumb
Summary: The team are back together after the betrayals of last year. But trust has to be rebuilt and loyalties mended - and fresh opportunities for betrayal lurk just around the corner. As their paths get darker and their lives more complicated, Angel's family will struggle to survive all that the universe has in store for them.An episode by episode 'Doyle Lives' Season 3 rewrite. 'Sleep Tight' posted, 'Forgiving' coming soon.
Relationships: Cordelia Chase/Allen Francis Doyle
Series: What You Do Afterwards AU [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1942738
Comments: 27
Kudos: 7





	1. Heartthrob: Part One

**Author's Note:**

> This story has already been written in its entirety but I will be posting it here in more manageable chunks. All 22 episodes have been rewritten however this season the order will change ever so slightly. The canonical 11th episode 'Birthday' has been moved to later in the season - so episode 10 'Dad' will be followed by episode 12 'Provider' and 'Birthday' will appear as the 20th episode of this rewrite. 
> 
> P.S - in this first chapter, there's a bit where we cut to Angel in Tibet - and then back to the hotel and then Tad-ah! Angel's in L.A... just read the cutaway as a flashback to 'this is what Angel got up to on his summer vacation' ... and don't let the timing of it irritate you too much. Thanks.

_"Bottom line is, even if you see 'em coming, you're not ready for the big moments. No one asks for their life to change, not really. But it does. So what are we? Helpless? Puppets? No. The big moments are gonna come. You can't help that. It's what you do afterwards that counts. That's when you find out who you are._

_-Whistler, Becoming Part 1_

* * *

The hotel seemed empty. She stayed very still and listened - yes she was sure of it - empty. She could hear the floorboards creak, and the curtains billow in the breeze - but not a single, solitary, living sound. It was probably safe to come out...

Fred eased the door to her room open, peered up and down the hallway, and then crept out - down the landing.

'I can understand people who drink too much,' a female voice suddenly floated through the air. Fred jumped. It was the Chosen First Consort - 'Cordelia', the consort had told Fred to call her, she was somewhere nearby. And if she was close by then that meant the other one was, as well... the King. The squirrelly young woman backed away from the stairs and scuttled back to her room, as quick as she could. She slammed the door.

* * *

'I understand people who put a little note on the parking meter saying that it's broken, when it's not,' Cordelia continued, as she and the guys walked out of the courtyard and through the front doors leading to the lobby. 'What I don't understand is people who worship demons.' She sank down on the round sofa. Her skin was smudged with ash and dirt, and her short hair was dishevelled. She breathed a huge sigh of relief, as she finally took the weight off her feet.

Doyle, equally dishevelled, dropped down next to her. 'I guess a guy's gotta do somethin' when there's nothin' on the tube.' He dropped his axe to the floor, it clanged loudly - the echoes reverberating around the wide open space.

...

Up in her room, Fred jumped at the disturbance… and then carried on scribbling on her walls with a feverish determination.

...

'Yeah but - Lu rite demons?' Gunn asked, wrinkling his nose in disgust. 'The stink on those things! If you're prince of the underworld, bro, take a jacuzzi once in a while.'

Doyle nodded along in agreement. 'I was always April fresh back when I was prince of an underworld.'

Cordelia laughed, 'King,' she corrected him, 'don't downgrade yourself Fran _cis_ doyle of the brachen clan - it cheapens everything for me!'

'And I'd hate to do that, Chosen First Consort of He who is Exalted,' Doyle smiled, and then kissed her.

'Hey - did you see you got some mail?' she asked him, pulling away from the kiss and changing the subject. He shook his head and she pointed over to the counter. 'Well you did - it's over there.'

With a deep sigh, Doyle pushed himself back up from the sofa and headed over to the front desk. Sure enough, there was an envelope with his name on it. He looked at the postmark, and swallowed, nervously. It was from the demon clinic. He ripped it open and began to scan the letter.

Over by the sofa, Wesley had taken his place, and was still thinking about their recent encounter with the malodorant demon prince and his loyal worshippers. 'It's sad - if the only way some people can find a purpose in life is by becoming obsessed with demons.' He leaned his head back against the sofa, and looked up at Gunn. 'By the way, Gunn, technically that wasn't a Lu rite it was a Mu rite. A subspecies of the Lu rite. The male sports a small telltale fin just behind the right shoulder.'

'So glad to know we're not the sad people obsessed with demons,' the street fighter cracked.

Wesley looked abashed. 'We have to be a little bit obsessed. We're detectives that specialise in these things,' he defended himself.

'And we're not sad!' Cordelia said. She had her compact out and was using the mirror to forlornly try and put her hair right. She pulled at a strand that was stuck out near the front, tried to work out where it should go - and then gave up. She'd be better off just going in the shower in Doyle's room and actually making herself look presentable. She was just fighting a losing battle, right now.

'No no, we're a happy and rambunctious lot if ever I saw one,' Wesley agreed. Gunn just stared at him. 'You're not even going to humour me just a little, are you?' the watcher asked him. The younger man shook his head, and Wesley sighed. 'I know we sacrifice a great deal of our - social lives,' he did know it - his girlfriend had left him because he was married to the cause. 'But we have to. Our work demands it.' The mission was what mattered - rule of the slaying game, numero uno.

'True,' Gunn nodded, 'and who has time for love when you're out there doing it with the demons?' It was Wesley's turn to give him a look, and the street fighter looked sheepish, 'well didn't that come out sad and wrong?'

'Some of us have time for love,' Cordelia pointed out. 'And really like doing it with demons - or you know - one of 'em.' Both men gave her a pointed glare. She just shrugged and laughed a little.

'Thanks for rubbing in our utter patheticness,' Gunn said to her.

'No problem.' Then she frowned and looked over at the counter where the demon in question was still stood, immobile. He hadn't said anything in minutes now. 'Hey, what's up with you?' she asked him.

He looked up from his letter, and hurriedly stuffed it in his pocket. 'Nothin'.'

'Yeah? What was your letter?'

'Nothin'.' He'd tell her when the guys weren't around. This was personal - and he didn't want his whole family knowing. 'So - um - what were you guys sayin'?'

'The guys were just bewailing their utter lack of love or social life,' Cordelia told him.

'Yeah? You need to find yourself a couple o' nice girls who are already in the demon huntin' business - otherwise you got no chance - the hours we keep… and the secrets.'

'Nice advice, sensei,' Gunn said to him, 'so where exactly do you suggest we find these demon hunter chicks?'

'Y'got me there, bud, I've already got the only one I know of… and the best one at that.' He sat back down on the sofa and kissed Cordy again. Gunn and Wesley looked sickened. The watcher got off the sofa, as the couple showed no signs of coming up for air, and went to peer up the staircase.

'You lookin' for Fred?' Gunn asked him, he glanced around to include the other two in his next question: 'anybody talked to her lately?'

'Not talked,' Cordelia said, pulling herself away from Doyle - but only from kissing him, she remained wrapped in his arms. 'Glimpsed. She comes out of her room every once in a while.'

'Not when I'm around,' Doyle said, twisting so that he too could peer in the direction of the staircase. 'I've tried to talk to her when you guys are all gone - and it's just the two of us in the hotel but… either she can't hear me knockin' or she just doesn't want to answer. After a while I just give up - I don't want her thinkin' I'm stalkin' her or nothin'. But I also don't want her thinkin' I don't care and that's she's all alone since…'

'Since Angel left,' Wesley finished up. Doyle nodded. 'It is a fine balance to strike,' the watcher said, thoughtfully. 'Not leaving her in complete solitude...but not crowding her. It's difficult.'

'And whilst we're difficultly striking a balance… Fred isn't exactly making giant strides towards mental health,' Cordelia pointed out. She nodded up the stairs, 'she's been hibernating up there for three months.'

'It's because Angel is gone,' the watcher told her, 'Fred became quite attached to him.'

'Angel groupie,' Gunn nodded, 'I get that.'

'Yeah, he's tall and dark and the way his coat billows out behind him in that mysterious and attractive way...'

The street fighter gave his Irish friend an odd look, 'uh - I meant because he rescued her from Pylea.'

'Oh right - me too - that's what I meant, as well.'

Cordelia laughed, and patted her boyfriend on the leg. 'He's always had a weakness for the coat,' she told her two friends, 'we try not to talk about it.' Then she sighed and looked wistful. 'I miss Pylea.'

'I would think you might,' Wesley said to her. 'You were there less than a week, you lived in a palace and were given a whole host of fancy titles and a diamond necklace…'

'Courtesy of His Majesty, the King,' Cordelia interrupted, and kissed Doyle to show her appreciation.

'Yes...well. Fred was there for five years. She was a slave, a runaway, they nearly chopped her head off. All those years she spent hiding out alone in that cave…'

'She survived,' Gunn said, 'girl's strong.'

But Cordelia snorted, she had a different take on the matter. 'The girl's trading one cave for another, how strong is that?'

'Now that's not fair, princess,' her boyfriend argued. ''S only natural that she's gonna need a period of readjustment… reacclimatise herself, like. You don't just bounce back from the kinda trauma she's been through…' he wrinkled his forehead, 'well OK - _you_ do. But normal people? Not so much.'

Wesley was still staring off up the stairs, as if hoping to see some sign of the young woman in question. 'When Angel comes back…' he started to say.

'When is Angel coming back?' Gunn interrupted. And Wesley turned back to look at him… he didn't have the answer to that.

But Cordelia did - sort of. 'Just as soon as he works through his grief a little,' she told the men.

But Gunn looked sceptical. 'A little? Buff….'

'Don't say the B word!'

'Remember… we have to get used to not sayin' the B word so that we don't uh - inadvertently - say her name in front of the big fella once he gets back - send him into an even deeper pit o' despair than normal.'

Cordelia nodded her head along, agreeing with her boyfriend. This was a rule that she had laid down in the hotel as soon as Angel had left. Not that they talked about Buff...the B word often - and less and less as time went on. She and Wesley had spoken a bit about her at first, and Doyle had checked that Cordy was OK, whenever they were alone, in the beginning. But now their life had moved on - it had had to - holding down the fort whilst Angel was out of town. They couldn't afford to dwell on dead slayers. But still, she was adamant there could be no slip ups when Angel returned… so, as infrequently as the slayer's name might come up, the rule still held.

But Gunn was still dubious. 'The B word was the love of his life. And he's what? 250? That aint no short life. That grief work is gonna take more than a vacation in Sri Lanka.'

'Tibet. And it's not a vacation, it's a spiritual retreat at a monastery.' Wesley corrected.

'Getting chanty with the boys,' Doyle agreed. 'Findin' inner peace and enlightenment through candles and prayer beads. Good times.'

'Angel and a bunch of monks in the middle of nowhere?' Gunn said, 'yeah - that's a party! He should have got hammered and went to Vegas just like I told him.'

'Angel doesn't need a lap dance!' Wesley shook his head in disbelief. 'He needs some peace and quiet to work through this...'

* * *

Angel gripped his sword and slashed at the red robed monks - life sucking shur-hod demons in disguise. He beheaded one, stabbed another and then did a back somersault twenty feet up onto the balcony, where he pushed another demon monk to its death.

...

Eventually, the great, bronze double doors of the monastery were pushed open, and a sweaty and blood stained Angel limped out. His guide was waiting for him outside. 'What happened?' the man asked, in Tibetan.

'Demon monks,' the vampire replied in the man's native language, 'should have gone to Vegas.' He walked off down the mountain. His guide cocked his head, and then peered through the open doorway - seeing the dead bodies of at least ten demon monks littering the temple floor.

* * *

The warm water cascaded over her head, and Cordelia luxuriated underneath it, cleansing away the dirt and grime and stink of the demon she had just helped to kill. She worked the shower gel into a lather and watched as the soap suds slid down her skin and swirled in the water at her feet, before disappearing down the plug hole. Once she'd lather, rinse, repeated several times, she shut the water off and wrapped a towel around herself.

Out in the bedroom, Doyle was waiting for her. He'd taken the letter back out of his jacket pocket and was stood by the bed, twisting the paper, nervously, in his hands. 'Um - Cordy - can we talk?' he asked her, swallowing deeply so that his prominent Adam's apple bobbed up and down in his throat.

She sat on the bed and began to towel her hair, 'sure - what's up?'

'It's… it's my letter...that I got.'

'I thought you said it was nothing?' she continued to rub her hair.

'It's from that demon clinic that I went to...about …' he trailed off - and noticed that Cordelia had stopped her rubbing. There was a long silence. And then, 'oh,' she said. More silence followed.

'They...they've got my res-results. I just need to go get 'em.'

'When?'

'Tomorrow.'

Another long silence. And then another 'oh.' Doyle looked at his feet, he frowned. Cordelia got up, and returned the towel she'd been drying her hair with back to the bathroom. Then she went back out to where Doyle still stood by the bed, staring at his shoes. 'Hey,' she said to him, her voice gentle. 'Whatever they tell you tomorrow - at least we'll know.'

The half demon nodded, slowly, but he still didn't look up. He didn't want to know - not really. Cordelia placed her hand against his cheek, cupping his face and softly lifting his head so he was looking at her. 'I've already told you,' her eyes were still gentle, and her voice matched, 'it doesn't make any difference to me - either way - I still only love you.' She brushed her lips against his in a tender kiss, and then her voice became brusque and business like, 'now get in the shower - you're all filthy and you stink of Lu rite demon.'

* * *

Washed, dressed and feeling halfway human once more, Cordelia was back at work. She was worrying about Doyle, who was still upstairs showering, and how he was feeling now he had an appointment to get his results… but there was nothing she could do about that right now, so she kept busy.

She crossed the lobby, rat traps in hand, and asked the guys whose turn it was to go and lay them in the basement. Both Wes and Gunn pointed at each other, 'his,' they said in unison. Cordelia rolled her eyes - they could fight hell beasts but they were afraid of rats!

'Man I hate rats,' Gunn grumbled, 'with their little beady eyes…'

'And their beady teeth,' Wesley added.

'And their little tails all woosh woosh,' the street fighter wiggled his bottom, where he sat, to try and convey the creepy movements of the vermin.

Cordelia laughed and made her way over to the basement. 'Well aren't you two just the biggest scaredies I ever saw…' she dropped the traps and screamed, as the door swung open just as she reached it. There was a still, startled moment and then…'You're back!' she flung her arms around the neck of the smiling vampire, who stood in front of her.

'Hey guys he's back!' she began to pull Angel into the lobby, and Wesley and Gunn got to their feet. 'Welcome home!' the watcher beamed, as Angel pulled him into a hug.

'What's up man?' the street fighter was also grinning, and greeted his former boss with a bear hug. He clapped him on the back.

Cordelia sat down on the sofa and smiled up at Angel. 'So did you have a good retreat? All peaceful and meditate-y?'

'Sure,' Angel replied, nodding, 'until the monks turned out to be life sucking shur-hod demons.'

'Vegas.' Gunn said, sounding wise.

That made the vampire laugh. 'Yeah.'

'But still - the point is you worked on things,' Cordelia told him, 'it's not like a holiday, where you come back home to your friends, you know, with some small mementos of your trip.' Her expression and voice had become hopeful - wheedling almost.

'Are you fishing for gifts?' Angel asked her.

'Yes!' she clapped her hands. You could always count on Cordy to be upfront. The newly returned vampire reached in his bag and handed her a shrunken skull with a tuft of black hair on top. She looked at it, askance, 'oh - a small human head.' But Angel chuckled and took it back out of her hand and tossed it to Gunn - who was much more appreciative.

The next item out of his bag was a necklace. 'Not as fancy as the one Doyle gave you,' he told her, referencing the ten carat ruby and diamond necklace she had acquired when she acted as consort to Doyle's King back in Pylea, 'but it's more suited to everyday wear.'

'It's gorgeous!' Cordy exclaimed, enthusiastically, tying it around her neck. She glanced down at the nestling pendant, 'and just look how it brings out my breasts!' The men didn't say anything. 'Oh, you were all thinking it!' she grinned. 'Thanks!'

Angel then handed Wesley his gift - a sixteenth century Murshan dynasty dagger. The watcher's face lit up, and he whipped it through the air experimentally. 'I've always wanted one of these! I can't wait to kill something with it!'

'Where's Doyle?' Angel asked.

'Upstairs - washing demon stink out of his hair...so you can give his present to me.' Cordelia reached out, eager for another gift. The vampire gave her a look. 'I'll pass it along!' she protested. He shrugged, and handed her the final present. It was a small, leather pouch. She shook it and something rattled inside. 'What's this?'

'Enchanted dice,' Angel told her, 'only lets their owner win - rolls snake eyes for anyone else.'

'I swear - you're actively trying to get Doyle's legs broken,' Cordelia grumbled.

'Just as long he's careful…' he glanced around the hotel lobby, 'the place looks good - how's Fred?' He could guess the truth from the way the three others all looked at each other. 'Hasn't come out of her room yet, huh? Well I'll settle back in and go and talk to her.'

* * *

Before he headed up to his own suite of rooms, he stopped off on a lower floor and knocked on Doyle's door.

'Yeah?' the familiar Irish voice called out.

'It's me.'

'Hey! - Angel, man...wait a minute…' there was the sound of someone moving hurriedly, a stumble, brief cursing, and then the door swung open. The two demons beamed at each other. 'You're back!' Doyle stated the obvious.

'Uh - yeah - just got in… Cordelia has your present…'

'You brought us back gifts? Man! You should go on retreats more oft…' Doyle suddenly remembered why it was that Angel had left them and gone away to meditate for three months. He choked himself off, cleared his throat and looked uncomfortable. 'Uh.. I mean.. Thanks. How was it?'

'The monks were evil.'

'Oh, so you weren't bored then?'

Angel laughed, 'actually… it kind of came as a relief… all that chanting…'

'Yeah? Did you speak to Fred yet?' He stepped out of the doorway and into the landing, 'she - she hasn't been doin' so well since you left us. I don't think she really trusts us. We sent up a lot of tacos but...'

'I'm just on my way now.'

'I'll come with - say 'hi' to her, if she opens the door. And you can tell me all about the evil monks. Now when you say 'evil' …' the two men walked down the corridor together, headed for the room that Fred had turned into her cave of solitude.

* * *

Fred was scribbling on the walls, muttering to herself. Her eyes were squinting, and she stuck her tongue between her teeth as she concentrated. She pulled back and glanced around the room at the one word she kept writing: _listen_. She repeated it to herself. And then there was a knock on the door, which made her jump. 'Fred?'...it was a male voice - though usually it was the consort, Cordelia, who came up during the day. 'Fred can you hear me?' the lilt in the accent told her that it was him...the King.

She backed away from the door.

'There's someone here who really wants to see you, darlin'... and I think you might wanna see him too.'

'Um no..no,' she gabbled, backing away even further, hitting up against the wall. 'I'm I'm fine… How are you? I don't need to see anyone. I'm doing real good here, no need to worry about me… thanks for checking.'

Outside the door, Doyle gave Angel an 'I told you so' look and shrugged. 'It's like this all the time. Won't open the door, won't come out. We leave takeout at the door and then just leave her to it most days.'

Angel frowned, and knocked on the door himself. Fred jumped again. 'It's me, Fred,' the vampire said.

'Oh, Angel.' The young woman hurriedly snatched her glasses from her face and then ran to open the door. And there he stood. The handsome man. The one who had saved her from the monsters. The one who had brought her home after all these years. Her only friend… it was just a shame her saviour was stood beside the King of the monsters, himself, now that he had returned to her.

The big smile that she wore for Angel faded when she looked at Doyle. 'Well - oh - hi there.' She frowned at the half demon, and he got the message that he wasn't welcome.

'Well, it's nice to see you Fred - finally - I'll just leave you two to it, shall I?' He gave the woman a short wave, and then backed away, heading back to Cordelia.

Fred watched him until he was out of sight, and then she turned back to Angel, her face alight with happiness, once more. 'Hi!'

She stepped forward, as if to give him a hug. But he stayed where he was, unmoving, and she quickly fell back, pretending that the awkwardness hadn't happened. 'Let me make some room,' she garbled, scurrying back inside and beginning to clear a space.

'Fred, I can't come in.'

Her face fell slightly, 'oh - of course not - you're worn from your trip. You go rest up, we'll catch up later,' she went to shut the door - keeping her face averted from Angel, as she did.

'Fred I wanna talk to you, I just can't come in unless…'

'I invite you!' she realised, 'instead of being rude; come in, come in,' and she opened the door wider, and let the vampire cross the threshold. He stuck his hands in his back pockets and looked around the room, staring at the writing she had scribbled on the walls.

'It's just a smidge of vampire in you as far as I'm concerned,' Fred was babbling, as he stood there and took it all in, 'but the universe has rules. I'm a great believer in rules and theorems, formulas…'

'I get that.'

'Aphorisms leave me a little dry.'

Angel tore his eyes from the walls, and raked his eyes over her, scrutinising her. She was still far too thin, and her actions were still nervous and squirrelly. She obviously hadn't made much in the way of progress whilst he had been gone. 'How are you?' he asked her, keeping his voice gentle.

She shrugged her shoulders, and didn't make eye contact. She was OK, she told him. Everything was pretty much the same as it was before he went away. Angel apologised for leaving so suddenly but Fred tried to assure him it was fine. However she cut herself off mid sentence to check that he was sticking around for good this time - belying her true feelings all too obviously. The vampire smiled at her, and promised he would be staying around this time.

He glanced around the room again, noting that one word scribbled over and over - _listen._ 'What are you listening for?' he asked her.

The click, she said. When everything would come together and make sense. There would be a click in her brain and then everything would be clear again. Angel frowned. 'What happens if you run out of wall space before you hear the click?'

But she didn't know.

'Fred, I know you spent five years in a world where humans could only be slaves or runaways. I get that that was no picnic. But you're home now. You're safe - you can come out of your room. I know it's gonna take some time.'

The woman began to write on the walls again, and Angel crossed over to her and gently took the marker from her hand. 'You don't have to write everything down.'

'I know - God -' she laughed a high pitched, nervous laugh, 'I should write _that_ down!'

'Why not take some small steps huh?' he asked her, beginning to lead her towards the door, 'like coming downstairs and hanging with us for a while.' He opened the door and ushered Fred towards it. 'There's nothing to be afraid of I swear…'

There was a sudden loud clattering and clanging; the sound of weapons tumbling to the ground, the thump of a body hitting the floor, a sudden burst of scream from Cordelia as she was taken by surprise, and a loud swearing from Doyle as the vision pain exploded into his skull.

'Hold that thought,' Angel told the young woman and he ran out of the room, along the landing, and down the stairs to see what the Powers that Be had in store for him this time.

* * *

By the time he got downstairs, Doyle's vision was over and Cordelia was helping him across to the sofa. Wesley and Gunn appeared from different parts of the hotel to see what the hubbub was. 'What did you see?' the vampire asked his sidekick.

'Vampires, man,' Doyle groaned, still clutching at his head. 'There's a party - they're crashin' it - they're killin' everyone…'

'Where?'

'Wilson College - Bonner hall.' Wesley and Gunn began to head for the doors but the half demon had more information. 'Room 918… there's a blonde vampire - a girl. You gotta watch out for her, man, she's the worst.'

'Is that it?' Angel asked.

Doyle nodded. He still looked a bit rough. 'Y' want me to come with?' he asked, his hand still pressed to his head.

'No - I got it. Wes and Gunn can sidekick. You stay here… with Cordelia.'

The half demon nodded gratefully, and Angel went to retrieve his duster. When he came back out into the lobby, he saw the young couple sat together on the couch. Doyle had his head rested on Cordy's shoulder and she was stroking his hair, soothingly. Seeing their closeness, and tenderness, made Angel's insides lurch with his own loneliness; so he turned his face away and strode out of the door.

'Man, I wish I'd left these things back in Pylea with the gruesome slug,' he heard Doyle groan, 'they're not gettin' any easier.'

'Believe me, sweetie, you _really_ wouldn't have liked the ritual for getting rid of them,' Cordelia told him.

'How can anythin' be worse than this?'

'It was worse…'

* * *

By the time the guys reached the dorm room - they were already too late. The vampires had been and seen and partied - and left. Some muffled moanings on the floor told the men that not every casualty was a lost cause, though. Wesley rang for an ambulance. Angel looked out of the window, and saw the car filled with vamps headed east on sixth street. He gave his own keys to Gunn, and then vamped out. He jumped out of the window and ran along the rooftops.

* * *

The vampires had taken two humans with them: a young man who was sat in the front with the blonde female vampire that Doyle had warned about, and a young woman, who was squashed in the back between two other vamps. 'Please,' the man whimpered, 'don't hurt her.'

The blonde vampire smiled a dangerous smile at him. 'Do you love her?' she asked. The man nodded his head. 'You'd do anything for her?' He nodded again. The vampire's expression became wicked. 'What if we let you go? Hmmm?' The man stared at her. 'Come on now, life's about making choices - what's it gonna be? You - or her?'

After a long moment, the man began to cry. 'Her - oh God - take her.'

'Gee, you call that love?' the vampire asked sarcastically. She patted the side of his head, 'when we get home, I'll show you love.'

...

Angel dropped down from the rooftops, landing on the hood. The human girl screamed. He grabbed the steering wheel and swung it, causing the car to swerve off the road and hit a building. The Plymouth Convertible came squealing to a halt behind it and Wes and Gunn jumped out, grabbing their weapons from the backseat.

Angel jumped down from the hood and slugged the vampire sat beside the girl. Then he pulled the two humans out and told them to run. They ran, and the family of demon hunters set to work...

Gunn was the first to stake a vampire, and he threw his stake over to Wesley once he was done, so that the watcher could dispatch his own. The third vampire, realising the trouble, began to run away. Angel and the blonde vampire exchanged blows. She was strong and formidable. She made to leave, but Angel grabbed her by the throat, ripping a locket from around her neck; and forced her back facing him, before managing to plunge a stake into her heart. Her vampiric features melted from her face and she gazed up at the man who had killed her, in confusion. 'Angelus?' she asked.

The man, himself, looked down at her, equally confused; and then she exploded in a cloud of dust. Angel stared down at the heart shaped locket that dangled from his fist...


	2. Heartthrob: Part Two

'So she was happy to see him?' Cordelia asked her boyfriend, from down on the floor, where she was putting away all the weapons he had knocked over during his vision. She was talking about Fred and Angel, of course.

'Um - yeah - she seemed real happy to see him… not me, though.'

Cordelia chuckled, 'well, you're really special, sweetie - and I love you very much - but you're no dark avenger.'

'I'm guess I'm not at that.' He smiled, briefly, but then it melted from his face and turned into a frown.

She caught his expression, and stopped what she was doing, resting back on her knees for a moment so she could give him her full attention, as they spoke. 'What is it?' she asked, 'the vision?'

'No...no… not the vision - it wasn't a bad one.'

'Then what?'

He didn't answer her, and her face crinkled up in concern. 'Is it tomorrow?' she asked. She was getting much better at perception, as she got older, especially when it came to Doyle. She knew him so well that she was pretty much fine tuned into all his moods, and could always guess what he was thinking. He was pretty good at doing the same to her, in fairness, but she was a heck of a lot more unpredictable than him… so his accuracy rating wasn't quite as good as hers. 'You're worried about what the doctor is going to say?'

He nodded slowly, not making eye contact. She left the weapons where they were and went to go sit beside him. 'Hey,' she said softly. He still didn't look up. 'Hey - look at me,' she cupped his face with her hand and brought his head up. 'I know this is hard,' she said to him, once he was finally looking at her, 'it is for me too - I'm scared - in a lot of ways I'd rather not know. But we _need_ to know. Or at least - _you_ do. And once we know - then we can handle it - whatever the outcome. We face it together, we move on together.'

'What if you move on without me?' he asked her, his voice low. He dropped his eyes as he spoke, as if he couldn't face looking at her whilst contemplating a future without her. 'What if it's bad news and you decide… I wouldn't blame y'... Not at all.'

She lifted his head again. 'Do you think I love you so little that I would let something as - _nothing -_ as this get in the way of us?' She sounded mock outraged at the thought, and it made him smile.

But he shook his head. 'It's not nothin',' he told her.

'It is… to me.'

He kept on shaking his head.

'Really?' she asked, 'are you saying that if the tables were turned - if it was the other way around…'

'It's not the other way around.'

'But if it was, you'd leave me?'

'Never!' he sounded genuinely outraged at that, and it was her turn to smile. She kissed him. 'And that's exactly how I feel,' she told him. 'Not knowing is the scary part. Once we know - whatever the result - we can just carry on with our lives. You'll feel better once you know - no matter what the outcome - I promise.'

'You think?'

'I'm Cordelia Chase, I don't think - I know.' She kissed him again, and this time he submitted to her ministrations, allowing her to make him feel better with her kisses and caresses. He was just beginning to respond, and start to feel enthusiastic about where this make out session was headed, when the front doors opened.

The three guys walked back in. 'We have a problem,' Angel said. The young couple broke apart, both of them looking irritated at the interruption.

* * *

_A bell rang out to sound the alarm as a fire blazed in the distance, creating the illusion of an early sunrise in the night sky. Elizabeth and James danced down the street, delighted with what they had just done. Following on behind them, much more sober, were the two older vampires: Darla and her boy, Angelus._

_The young lovers whispered sweet nothings to each other - Elizabeth would need a thousand years to sketch the perfect plane of James' face, whilst James would need ten thousand simply to name the colour of her eyes. Angelus was not impressed by such endearments. 'They're green,' he told the other man, 'but take your time - in fact - don't. We have a ship to catch and Holtz may not be far behind.'_

_Holtz was never far behind - not for five years now. He was unyielding, unstoppable in his quest… but then Angelus and Darla may have brought some of that upon themselves._

_Elizabeth chided her sire for knowing neither love nor poetry. She laughed as she said it, she was too happy in the embrace of her own lover to really care for the feelings of Angelus._

_'He knows other things,' Darla told her, 'marvellously vile and ripping things.' Neither of the elder vampires cared much for love. 'Didn't we eat a poet in Madrid, once?' she asked her boy._

' _Troubadour.'_

_James spun in the street, looking at all the little buildings with their shutters closed and their doors locked. 'Everything's closed! Pity I wanted to spend some of the Count's gold.'_

_They had just eaten the Count DeLeon, stolen his gold, and burned his villa to the ground. It was the flames from their own misdeeds which now licked the night sky, illuminating the town of Marseilles ahead of them. Angelus was angry about the fire. When it came to killing there were none more skilled - none more depraved than he. He had an artists flair for snuffing out life, an eye for the truly debauched. But nevertheless, he was cautious when it came to detection. He knew far too well that a clumsy kill, an unnecessary signal of their presence in the world, could bring about the wrath of an angry mob, a vampire hunter… or the slayer. And then all that artistry, all that evil, would be no more than dust in the wind._

_But James and Elizabeth were young. New. They were brash, rash and worst of all - in love. The thrill of the chase, the headiness of a kill, the delight of violence, slaughter and mayhem was all they cared for. Well, that - and each other. They did not know yet to value their safety - or their secrecy… but they would learn, or they would die. The two young lovers did not care that they had just painted a blood red sign in the sky telling Holtz where to find them. But Angelus did. And so did Darla._

' _He has killed scores of our kind,' she told James, 'he has hunted Angelus and I across half of Europe. God, if he follows us to Morocco what then? The new world?' She did not want to return to the Americas; to the fetid, malaria ridden, famine stricken swamp where she had died. The human girl, Constance, had never known luxury or wealth; the finest silks and linens, the best hotels, the grandest parties. But the vampire, Darla, was used to all that now - used to the decadence of the old world. She would not willingly return to the rough frontier of the new. She did not wish for Holtz to chase her back where she had come from._

' _I say we stay and fight the bastard!' James declared._

_He made Angelus snort, 'yeah - but you're an idiot.' This boy had no comprehension of what Holtz was capable of. He was not willing to believe that no vampire survived his wrath - after all Angelus and Darla had escaped him again and again. Not without effort though._

_Elizabeth looked at the older woman, her expression judgemental and disapproving. 'I heard you were both trapped in a barn by him and you fled, leaving Angelus to die!'_

' _It's not true!' James protested, sounding outraged at the very thought._

_But Angelus insisted it was true - she had hit him with a shovel, wished him luck, and then run off on their only horse. Darla smilled, 'life's full of surprises,' she said._

' _Ah - life's boring - you're full of surprises.'_

_Of course, once he'd caught up with her in Vienna he did make her pay for her sins; again and again and again. But James and Elizabeth would not be able to fathom the things they had got up to, Angelus reasoned, they were in love._

_The older pair of vampires walked away down the cobbled streets, but Angelus soon realised that the young lovers were not following them. Elizabeth had stopped to look into a shop window and was gazing at the locket on display there. It was gold, and shaped like a heart. James came up behind her, to see what had distracted her. 'Isn't it pretty?' she asked._

' _No.'_

' _James!'_

' _Not as pretty as it's going to be...' He picked up a rock and smashed the window, reaching in to take the necklace '...when it's worn by the prettiest one of all.' He draped the locket around her neck and fastened the clasp for her. She fondled the heart, and smiled up at her lover. 'Oh I adore it! I'll never take it off!' James swung her off her feet, spinning around and kissing her. They both laughed in delight._

_But down the street, the smashing of the window had attracted the attention of the soldiers stationed in the town. Uniformed men began to march down the cobbles towards them. Angelus sighed, 'this is where love gets you.'_

_James sent the women on to the ship, and asked Angelus to join him in a rout - fighting the soldiers for fun and adventure. The older vampire sighed again, but the younger man was not deterred. 'Come on you bloody frogs! I broke the window and I'll break your skulls!' the soldiers began to fall back, and James began to laugh. 'See? All you have to do is stand up to them! What are you afraid of?' he yelled at the guards, as they began to fall back._

_There was the sound of hoof-beats against the stones, and then a group of riders appeared in the square, circling the two vampires. Angelus sighed a final time, 'not us,' he told James. The lead rider pointed his crossbow straight at the two demons. 'I hope she treasures that locket,' Angelus said._

* * *

Angel lay in bed, awake, staring at the ceiling… he'd broken off his story at the point where he was captured by Holtz - much to Gunn's disgruntlement - as that was a tale for another day. He had related to them what he knew of Elizabeth and James and the history of the necklace that now lay on his nightstand. That was all they needed to know.

He felt - empty - inside. Finding Elizabeth, telling her story, had only served to remind him how very long his own life had been. There was nowhere he hadn't gone, there was nothing he hadn't done. He spoke and read multiple languages, he had read all the great works of literature - in their native language and in English - and compared the nuances the different languages wrought on the text. He knew about art, he knew about music, he knew about the different religions and cultures that scattered the globe - both demonic and human. He had learned everything. Seen everything. Filled his entire 250 years with knowledge and remembered it all. But he still felt empty.

Had Elizabeth and James filled the intervening centuries learning all the world had to offer, as he had? Or had they spent it wrapped up in one another - as heady and breathless as they were in the beginning - delighting in their passion for one another and not much else? Spike and Drusilla, they had been much the same. A hundred years of love and devotion and jealousy. They were human, almost, in the way they had clung to each other...until Spike had betrayed them with…

But it had been different for him and Darla. Angelus had never loved. He was incapable of it. The Judge had said it himself, when he had tried to burn the humanity from him after… there had been no humanity to burn. For 150 years he had lived and travelled and belonged with only one woman - but he had never loved. Had they been so very odd? He wondered. Were Elizabeth and James, and Spike and Dru, the exceptions or the rule?

Had he loved when he was Liam? He thought to himself. Not his father - no - he had never loved the little merchant who had caused him such fear and misery. But what of his mother and his sister, Kathy? Was that selfish, boorish, drunken young man even capable of something as selfless of love… or had he just enjoyed the love they had bestowed upon him? Taken their adoration of him for granted, and felt a modicum of fondness in return for the warmth their love had kindled inside of him.

He rolled over in his bed. No. If Liam had loved, it was too long ago now - too fragile and too tenuous to mean anything to the man he was today. Liam was Liam. Angel… now he had lived for 250 years and he had loved only….

But everything was different now. He punched his pillow. Circumstances had changed. But some things could never be. He would have to learn to live without. For the sake of everyone, he would have to learn to keep going without hope. He would have to keep quiet - keep it inside. He could never have what he wanted. And he was facing an eternity alone, living with that knowledge, with that pain. And so he felt empty - it was the easiest way to feel.

* * *

Angel was not the only person finding it difficult to sleep that night. Two floors down, locked in his own room, Doyle also lay awake staring at the ceiling. He did not feel empty. He felt sick.

Cordelia had stayed the night with him, rather than return home to her own apartment, after their long day. She had tried to continue where they had left off earlier, once they were in bed; arching an eyebrow at him, kissing his neck and running one tickling, suggestive finger down the length of his body, making him quiver. But the moment was gone - he was no longer in the mood. So she had shrugged and given up, kissing him lightly, before falling asleep. She now lay curled up beside him, her head nuzzled on the pillow right by his shoulder, her right arm flung casually across his chest. She breathed deeply and rhythmically, her sleep punctuated by the occasional snore. Her boyfriend glanced down at her peaceful slumber, and then returned his fretful eyes to the ceiling.

He had his own right arm wrapped around her, and held her as she slept. His hand was stroking her hair, gently, but it was an unconscious movement on his part. His entire mind was focused on the next day - and what the doctor might tell him - and what that might mean for him and Cordelia.

He knew what she said. And he believed she meant it - every word. Just as she had promised to wait for him throughout the jail sentence he had never had to serve; he knew that here, today, in this moment - Cordelia was determined to stand by him, and spend her whole life with him. But he had lived and loved and lost before now. She was not the first woman who had promised to be with him forever. Forever was a long time - and Cordelia was still so very young, barely more than a kid - just like Harri had been.

He knew it was his fault that his wife had left him in the end. He didn't blame her for walking away, not at all. He didn't hold it against her that she had broken her promise. Circumstances - and his own actions - had forced her to. But that was the problem... Harri _had_ loved him. With all her heart. She had meant it when she vowed to be by his side for the rest of her life. But life had a funny way of working things out. And now Harri was long gone.

And Cordelia was here. And he was so thankful for that. When Harri had left him he hadn't believed he would ever be glad of it. But he was now. Because all he wanted in the world was Cordelia. And just like his ex wife had, his girlfriend now loved him with all her heart - and had no interest in a future without him. Tomorrow, however, their circumstances would change. And God alone knew what stupid thing he'd do to start pushing the woman he loved away from himself. Drink, probably, and self loathing. Maybe he'd even fall back into his bad gambling habits and once more work up the debts that Cordy had given him the opportunity to clear. There was only so much Cordelia would be able to take - would be willing to take. She shouldn't have to put up with any of it.

So in the end she would leave him. He knew it. It was inevitable. Oh, she wouldn't really be leaving him over _this_ \- just like Harri hadn't really left because he was a demon. But in the end she would go - and this would be the root cause of it. It would be the reason he changed - the way he managed to destroy her love for him.

He held her closer, and exhaled deeply. Tears began to prick in his eyes as he realised that his nights like this, holding her in his arms, were numbered. It was like watching a slow motion car crash. He knew exactly what was to come - and where all the pitfalls were - he just didn't trust himself to avoid them. He would wreck everything, in the end, because that was what he always did.

Cordelia moaned in her sleep, he glanced down at her and dropped a kiss on the top of her head. He forced himself to close his eyes. But still, he didn't sleep.

* * *

James stood in the shadows and watched as the sun rose on a new day. On a new world. His first day in over 200 years without Elizabeth. The world was empty now, without meaning, without hope, without love. He wanted to die.

'We did everything we could,' the vampire who had run from the fight told him, 'but they were… he was too much for us.'

'Angelus.' James' voice was flat, dead, as he stated the name of the man who had killed his love.

'Yeah,' the vampire agreed, 'one of us - hunting his own kind. It's sick.'

But James did not understand how this could be. The man he knew, the Angelus of legend, was an animal; a depraved creature who bathed in the blood of slaughtered innocents. He did not save humans and kill vampires.

But the flunkey had heard the rumours of Angel's curse. That Gypsies had restored his human soul and now he walked the earth atoning for his past crimes. He even ran a business. He made money hunting and killing his own kind. James barely listened. 'She's gone,' he said. It was all that mattered.

'It was horrible,' his flunkey told him. 'She was bringing you two ripe and rosy humans. And he just flew out of the sky and…'

'And you ran.'

'No I fought!' the vampire protested, defending his actions. 'But when I saw it was hopeless I returned to you. I knew you would want to know how it happened… who was responsible.'

'And now I do.' He stared forwards, watching the way the edges of the shadows flickered and waved in the strengthening sunlight.

'You want to be alone,' the vampire said to him, turning to leave.

'No,' James corrected him, 'I want to die.' He pushed the other vampire out into the light and watched as he screamed and burst into flames. After a moment of burning agony, the vampire exploded into dust. James did not react.

* * *

'Are you sure you don't want me to come with you?' Angel heard Cordelia's voice float up the stairs, as he left his suite of rooms. Her voice was tender, and concerned. She must be talking to Doyle - no one else got those loving, honeyed tones from the brittle Miss Chase. The vampire decided to wait - to not interrupt. He stood on the first floor landing and looked down at the pair of them. They were stood by the front doors. Doyle had his jacket on, and Cordy had her arms around him, clasping her hands behind his neck so she could look into his eyes, even as she held him close.

The half demon shook his head.

'Are you sure?' her voice was sceptical. 'Angel won't mind. It might be easier if I'm there with you - waiting.'

'No this is somethin' I gotta do by myself.'

She unclasped her hands and stroked the hair at his left temple. Even from all the way up on the landing, Angel could see how gentle and loving her expression was, and it made his insides twist to see it. Things were so different for him now… watching Cordy and Doyle together was hard.

'You don't _ever_ have to do _anything_ by yourself,' she was telling him. 'We're a team. If I come with you then we can get the news together… you won't have to come back and tell me yourself.'

But he shook his head again. 'The agency doesn't stop runnin' just 'cause I got some bad news. We've got a case on… This Elizabeth and James thing. Angel needs your help. I'll be back soon.'

She hugged him, then, 'we don't know it's bad news yet,' she pointed out. 'Come straight back and tell me, promise?' she looked back into his eyes, and he nodded. She kissed him, 'whatever happens - I love you - you know that?' He nodded again, kissed her, and then left.

Angel came downstairs. 'Doyle's going somewhere?' he asked his secretary.

She turned away from the door and looked at him, she seemed a bit flustered to find him there. 'Oh - he… just has an appointment. He'll be back soon. No biggie.' She flashed her brightest grin at him, to cover her own anxiety. 'So how are you this morning?'

'I'm OK - where are Wes and Gunn?'

'They're out hitting the streets - talking to our sources. Looking for James.'

'Why?' Angel asked, he sat down on the bottom step and opened the gold locket, looking at the ancient daguerreotypes of the two lovers that Elizabeth had kept inside.

'Um - because he's probably hunting you down on a revenge kick and we need to find him before he finds us - _hello?_ '

'If they're still together,' Angel shrugged. 'It's been 200 years since I saw them…'

'And that whole time - she's still wearing his locket - they've got the big forever love!' She fondled the pendant that Angel had given her the day before, and thought of the diamond necklace her own boyfriend had chosen for her out of his own personal treasury back in Pylea, wishing that she had something he had given her that was more suitable for everyday - so she could always carry a part of him with her - even when he was away. 'That's the kind of love I know something about,' she told Angel, 'if I were James right now….You know how it is. It's something you know about too and…' she trailed off.

The vampire tore his eyes away from the images of the vampire couple and looked up at her, 'and… what? What were you gonna say?'

'Say? Me? Nothing! What makes you think…?'

'Because I know you,' he told her, bluntly. Cordelia always had something to say.

'Well, really it's none of my business.'

'And that always stops you.'

'Well - actually - it is my business,' she stepped closer towards him, headed for the stairs where he sat. ' _Our_ business. Because we're trying to do a job here and what affects you affects me. Besides I don't want to see you suffer more than you have to.' She sat down beside him; and he looked at her, a quizzical expression on his face. She took a deep breath. 'I don't think you should blame yourself or feel guilty for her death,' she told him.

'I don't,' Angel assured her. He was a bit confused.

Not as much as Cordelia - who seemed completely taken aback by his admission. But after a beat she recovered herself, 'good,' she said, 'glad to hear it.'

'I mean I didn't even know who she was when I killed her.'

Cordelia's eyes went wide and round in understanding and exasperation. 'No, Angel, I don't mean her. I meant…' she didn't like to say the name. She could hardly be the first to break her own rule, now, could she?

'Oh.' Angel's voice was heavy. He snapped the locket shut, and stuck it in his pocket. 'You want to talk about…?'

Cordelia rested a hand on his shoulder, and looked into his eyes. For a moment, Angel thought he saw the same concern and tenderness that she had shown to Doyle just minutes earlier. But this time, her gentleness was for him, alone. 'She was the love of your life,' her voice was soft and sympathetic. 'And she died. And you weren't even there when it happened. You couldn't help her fight. You couldn't save her. You couldn't die with her.'

Angel didn't reply, instead he just broke her gaze and looked down at his shoes. She was trying to relate. She thought she was relating, but she didn't get it. She couldn't get it.

'I will never live as long as you,' she said to him, her hand still resting on his shoulder. 'And I get that I can't ever understand eternity - not the way you do. But I do know about forever love.' Angel felt his insides twist again at her words, but he didn't react and so she didn't notice. 'I can't imagine… or more to the point… I can't _bear_ to imagine what it must feel like to lose that one person - to not even get to say goodbye. I don't know exactly what you're going through. But I know that none of this is your fault… and you can't blame yourself for it, no matter how much you may want to.'

He still said nothing, and so she removed her hand from his shoulder. He missed her warmth straight away. She sighed. 'This is gonna be one of those talks where I do all the talking, isn't it?' she asked. He didn't respond, and she held her hands up in surrender. 'OK, well, I'm not gonna pry, it's not my style.' She stood up and began to walk away. He waited a moment and, sure enough:

'OK it's totally my style,' she spun round to face him again. 'But I can tell that I'm not getting anywhere right now. But you have to tell me one thing. You owe me that much.' He looked at her, expectantly. Her eyes shone in sudden eagerness, 'what the hell happened with Holtz?'

The vampire smiled to himself - Cordelia Chase - you just couldn't second guess her.


	3. Heartthrob: Part Three

_Holtz had climbed down from his horse, and he approached Angelus. 'Where is she?' he asked. He wanted Darla… after what she and her boy had done to his family - he would not rest until he had them both. But he was forever stumbling across the idiot male vampire. His sire was more wily, more difficult to entrap. And it was her that Daniel Holtz wanted in his grasp._

_The vampire hunter slugged Angelus across the chin. The vampire fell backwards and was hauled back to his feet by two of Holtz's men, who kept a tight hold of him. Holtz pulled out a stake, and held it against the demon's throat. 'There are worse things than death, Angelus. I can keep you alive for months - years if I've a mind to.' He lowered the stake so that it rested against the vampire's chest - right over his heart. 'Now you_ are _going to tell me where she is.'_

_Angelus laughed, of course he was going to tell Holtz the whereabouts of his sire. He had no wish to suffer needlessly. He did not want to play the big, strapping hero of the piece. He nodded his head towards James, 'she's with his lass.'_

' _Shut your mouth, you bloody coward!' Yelled James, infuriated and disbelieving that the older vampire would endanger the women so - and in order to save his own hide. Angelus chuckled, ruefully. James was in love, he told Holtz, it was all very passionate and befuddling. He offered the vampire hunter a deal. He'd give him James and the two women in return for his own freedom - the women were down at the docks, he added._

' _I'll kill you!' James tore Angelus away from his human captors and hit him a hard right cross._

_Holtz picked up his crossbow and aimed it at the fighting vampires. 'Kill them,' he ordered his men. Bolts began to fly at them from every direction. Angelus was hit in the shoulder. He knocked a guard from his horse, and jumped up into the saddle. James scrambled on up, behind him, and the two vampires rode out of the square - the flying crossbow bolts following them as they fled._

_They pulled up at the end of an alleyway. 'I think we lost them,' Angelus said. He had multiple bolts sticking out of his torso. He was bleeding heavily, but none of them had penetrated his heart. James pushed the injured vampire off the horse and slid forward in the saddle. Angelus landed in the street with a thump, yelling out as the force of impact drove the bolts deeper into his flesh._

' _I'd kill you where you lay if I didn't have to get to Elizabeth,' the passionate young vampire told him._

' _Excuse me. I'm lying here with various arrows stuck in me, saving your life,' Angelus said to him, still rolling down on the ground._

' _I'll be sure to tell Darla the utter lack of concern you had for her.' He turned the horse and rode away._

_Angelus forced himself to his feet. 'Buy her a hat!' he yelled after the vanishing figure, 'she loves hats. Why are people always running off and leaving me?' he wondered to himself. He pulled an arrow out of his side, and looked at it. 'Am I such a bad bloke? I don't think so. Not once you get to know me.' He pulled the bolt from his shoulder, 'Oh I really need a doctor...'_

* * *

Doyle sat in the waiting room and flicked through the months old copy of the enquirer that had sat on the plastic table beside him. Tom Cruise was filing for divorce from Nicole Kidman… he was pretty sure that was over already, he seemed to remember Cordelia talking about it. There were worries about what would happen to Nicole's career now she was no longer hitched up to the brightest star in the Hollywood firmament. She had been filming some little musical down in Australia… but there were copyright issues getting it released… she had been pregnant when he'd filed for divorce. Doyle's eyes glazed over, and he put the magazine down, feeling sick once again.

He began to tap his feet against the floor, anxiously. He glanced at his watch. The doctor must be running late - his appointment should have started ten minutes ago. This is what happened when you were forced to go to demon clinics, and not normal hospitals, he thought to himself. The receptionist must have noticed his tapping, maybe it was irritating her, because she spoke to him. 'I'm very sorry for the delay Mr. Doyle, Dr. Gregson is just running a bit late - he's sloughing, you see.'

Doyle didn't see. He had no idea what that meant, but he nodded his head and mumbled that it was fine - he didn't mind.

The door to the waiting room suddenly burst open with a loud bang, making everyone inside jump. A young man, who appeared furious - but whose eyes were red rimmed as if he had been crying, marched into the room. He ignored everyone, and headed straight for the doctor's office. Doyle sighed to himself - queue jumpers - was there any excuse? It was a good job Wesley wasn't here, he'd be clucking his tongue with impotent fury, as he seethed at the bad manners. He wouldn't say anything, though. You never said anything to line cutters. You just tutted. The half demon tutted. It made him feel better.

The nurse followed the angry young man down the hall, scurrying at his heels. 'You can't go in there,' she said to him. He ignored her, and flung open the door to the office. 'You can't go in there he's sloughing! Dr. Gregson I did tell him.' This last part was to the doctor, who was sat behind his desk moaning to himself as he pulled brown gunk off his face, peeling it off like a thick, viscous face mask.

Once he was finished, he threw the gunk in the toxic waste trash can at his side, and smiled at the nurse. 'That's quite alright, Sandy.' The nurse nodded and shut the door, and the demon doctor looked at the man in front of him. It was a vampire, and the demon could sense the rage and the heartbreak rolling off him in waves. 'I gather this is a matter of urgency?' he asked.

'I need it,' James said.

'It?'

'The cure.'

'You're aware of the price?' the doctor asked him, 'it's a steep one.'

But James was aware of the price - it was of no matter to him. 'I've already paid it,' he said.

'Very well,' the doctor shrugged and called Nurse Sandy back into the room. 'We need to prepare the patient,' he told her.

James took his shirt off and laid down on the silver gurney that acted as an operating table in this little demon clinic. Dr Gregson and the nurse put their masks on, and the doctor raised his scalpel. 'This shouldn't hurt,' he told the vampire, cutting into his chest, 'too much.'

...

Doyle heard the screaming out in the waiting room. His eyes flew over to look at the receptionist, in alarm. She tried to smile at him, reassuringly. He took some deep breaths. He was just here for some results, he told himself. Just a little chat, and being shown information… he'd already been through the tests and they hadn't caused him to scream out like that. They weren't going to be operating on him, today, he told himself - he was just here for some results.

* * *

Wes and Gunn sat at the bar in Caritas, and waited. Lorne was putting on a matinee performance. He was singing, 'I lost my heart in San Francisco,' and a whole host of older demons were sat out in the chairs, looking misty eyed at the renditions of the classics from their youth.

'He said he had something?' Gunn asked the watcher, Wesley nodded. 'So when's he gonna show?'

'Any time now.'

The song came to an end, and the elderly demon audience broke out in applause. As the clapping died away, and Lorne left the stage to take a break, Merl appeared - looking shifty. He glanced at the two men who were waiting for him. 'I'm not dealin' with you if the bloodsucker's around,' he said to them.

'Angel's not here,' Wesley told him, reaching in his jacket pocket to bring out the envelope of cash.

'Good,' Merl said, 'he's always beating me up, or hanging me upside down and he never pays likes he's supposed to.' Wesley laid the cash out in front of him. 'Jeez if I could've made a living in Akron I would never've come back to this smog pit,' the stool pigeon grumbled.

'Tick tock Merl,' Gunn's patience was wearing thin.

'Yeah well - this thing took a little more leg work than I anticipated, the price is gonna change.'

'Really?' Wesley raised his eyebrows and took the first bill back from the top of the pile. He folded it back into his pocket.

'Hey! Hey!' Merl protested. The watcher took another bill and the stool pigeon gave in, grabbing the money and spilling the info. 'This guy, James, you're looking for? He's alive, he's in town and he knows what Angel did to his heartthrob.'

The two men exchanged a glance. Lorne came up behind the small group and began to listen in - though he didn't say anything, for now.

'He's out for blood,' Merl told the two associates. Gunn took out his cell and began to dial.

* * *

'Yeah - OK - do that. I'll cover this end.' Angel put the phone down. Cordelia looked up from her desk, 'what's up?'

'He's alive. Wes and Gunn are gonna track him down.' He began to head over to his weapons cabinet.

Cordelia got up from her chair and trotted after him. 'What if they can't?' she demanded.

The vampire shrugged. 'Doesn't really matter - I know where he's headed.'

'Here,' Cordelia surmised, 'for you.' She looked less than impressed.

Angel opened the cabinet and peered in. 'This looks different.' He glanced back over his shoulder, 'I want you to get out - head home whilst it's still light out and stay there.'

'Hmmm - no.' She folded her arms and glared at him.

He sighed to show his frustration. 'Yes', he told her. Cordelia never did as she was told it was infuriating...and completely endearing. It was one of the things he… He shook his head. 'Where's my hurling axe?' he asked, scanning all the weapons that hung there. 'This _is_ different!' he accused.

'I moved some stuff around when you were away,' the office manager told him. He rolled his eyes. 'They were dust catchers!' she protested. 'They kept making Doyle sneeze - and you know how grouchy he gets when he's all green and spiky. One time - we were making out - and he nearly took my eye out! And then came all the fussing, and the apologising and the guilt - ugh! Those weapons had to go, buster.'

'Well I'm sorry if my demon hunting business is getting in the way of your _love life_ , Cordelia,' he did not sound sorry at all, 'but now I really just need you to go home.'

'I'm sticking with you,' she told him.

He felt some of the annoyance he had felt at her talking about how she had rearranged his weapons, to better facilitate her intimacies with Doyle, melt away at that. 'I appreciate your courage,' he told her. He did - it meant a lot that she wanted to stay with him when he was in danger. That was the kind of thing she usually only did for the half demon. 'But I don't wanna see you get hurt!'

'Neither do I!' she replied. 'I go home, he'll come after me because I'm home alone - that's what they do! They come after you when you're alone.' She remembered all too well the time Angel had sent her away to safety only for her to find a mad vampire slayer in her living room. 'Oh sure, Cordy, go home. Be a hostage with the torture and the fear and the tort…'

'Cordy! Will you, just once, do what I tell you without arguing about everything, OK? Hurling axe? Basement?' He began to walk towards the basement door, and she scurried on after him.

'I'm not arguing! I just know I'd be a lot safer by your side rather than all alone at home.'

Angel reached the door and opened it. James stood on the other side. He slugged Angel across the jaw and sent him flying backwards. 'Why did you do it?' He demanded.

* * *

After another hour, Doyle was called into the doctor's office. Finally! If he had known that the appointment was going to run this late he might have stopped off at a bar for a couple of belts first - stiffen his nerves. He frowned to himself. No he wouldn't have done that, he told himself. Morning drinking was a thing of the past for him, something he had done at the very depths of his despair. He wasn't going to fall down that rabbit hole again - not before he even knew there was anything to despair about. And even after... He knew what he was like now, maybe he could control himself. For Cordelia's sake, if not for his own.

Dr. Gregson greeted him with a smile and shook his hand. 'I'm sorry for the delay,' he said. Doyle mumbled that it was fine, again. He sat down, and the doctor fixed him with a kindly stare. 'Now you're paying in cash?' he said, glancing at his notes, 'is that correct?'

'Um - yeah… yeah it is.' He had had to scrimp and save over the summer to be able to pay the demon's fees. He knew Cordelia would have gladly handed over the money she had made from her latest commercial - the suntan lotion one that had upset her so much - but they didn't know when she would get any acting work again, or if she would even audition - after the disaster of her last shoot, so he didn't want to take that money off her. She had given him so much already. And he gave her so little in return. And now it seemed there was one less thing he was going to be able to provide her with.

'It's a shame,' the doctor was saying. 'I collect rare items… and I hear you have an unusual and rare gift?'

'The visions?' Doyle said, he shook his head. 'I'm not that fussed for knowin' that I'll sell my eyeballs to find out. I'd go to a normal clinic only …'

'Only you're not normal. And therein lies your entire problem. Well, pity, but cash will do.'

Doyle reached into his pocket and pulled out the envelope. He had paid half on the day he had had his tests, and was paying the other half for the results. Dr. Gregson took the envelope and pulled out the notes, counting them all. 'Well...all this is in order, so...' he shuffled his files and began to look at Doyle's records. 'You were here a few weeks ago for fertility tests, that's right isn't it?'

Doyle nodded, he opened his mouth to say something; but his throat constricted and his mouth dried up, all of a sudden, so all he managed was a small choke of assent. He had had to come and find out - ever since Silas, the evil priest, had told him the half breeds could not have children, he had needed to know. He couldn't live with the uncertainty - the nagging doubt - no matter how much he wanted to tell himself that a demon from another world couldn't possibly know that about him. So, once the money was saved, he had come for the tests.

'Now you're half demon,' Dr. Gregson said, 'human mother and ...Brachen demon for a father - that's an unusual combination. Humans don't tend to go for the spikes.'

The half demon looked down at his shoes, he didn't suppose his mother had 'gone' for his father at all. He had never dared ask - it wasn't the sort of thing you talked to your mother about. And he already hated his demon father enough without having to know the full, grisly truth of his own conception.

'Yes, well,' the doctor continued, seeing the small man's reticence to comment on his own parentage, 'Your mother - as a human, had 23 chromosome pairings. A total of 46 chromosomes in each cell… this is what all full humans have - allowing for occasional abnormalities that show up as medical conditions - such as Downs Syndrome, of course. But your average human - 23 chromosome pairs per cell. 46 total.'

Doyle nodded. He was no great shakes at science, but this seemed fairly straight forwards. Dr. Gregson continued. 'Brachen demons, however, have 26 chromosomal pairs - resulting in 52 chromosomes per cell, total. Demons often have higher pairings than humans - it accounts for what appears to be their supernatural strengths or abilities. Often, there's nothing mystical about it - just different biology to what the humans are used to.'

Doyle nodded again - he was not good enough at either biology or math to see where this was headed. Dr. Gregson turned the file around so that the half demon could see the DNA patterning his own results had yielded. It meant nothing to the Irishman - but the demon doctor spelled it out. 'You - as a hybrid between the two species - have ended up with a mixed bag of chromosomes. Halfway between your mother and father. She has 46, he had 52 - you, on the other hand have 49 chromosomes per cell.'

Doyle frowned, 'but that's not an even number,' he pointed out.

'Exactly,' Dr. Gregson told him, snapping the file shut. 'You have 24 pairings of chromosomes and then one left over. In every cell in your body, I'm afraid. Now the extra chromosomes do account for your extra abilities - added strength, though not as great as a pure demon, your ability to break your bones and pop them back in - and the strength to bear the visions without the contents of your skull imploding. But the extra - unpaired - Y chromosome?' he shook his head. 'I'm sorry to tell you that that abnormality leaves you completely unable to produce sperm… as it does in any male hybrid creature, with an odd number of chromosomes, I'm afraid.'

Doyle hung his head, 'Completely unable … So I can't ever…?'

The Doctor smiled at him, a comforting, pleasant smile. For a demon he really wasn't a bad bloke. He had a good bedside manner, as it were. 'I'm sorry to have to tell you, Mr. Doyle, that the test results show us that you are unable to father children of your own. I know this news - whilst perhaps not completely unexpected - must be very distressing to hear.'

Doyle's eyes blurred with tears, but he forced himself to blink them back. His legs felt like dead weights, his stomach felt like a cannonball had been dropped right inside of it, and he was aware of the sound of his own blood pounding inside his ears. It was just as he feared. One more thing his demon half had taken from him. One less future he could offer Cordelia...

* * *

Angel hit back; and Cordelia screamed, as her vampire friend was thrown bodily across the room, landing out in the lobby.

'Was it because I had something you could never have?' James demanded, bearing down on the fallen man. Angel forced himself back to his feet and struck out again, he yelled at Cordelia to get back, and she ran to hide behind a pillar. And then the two vampires fought. James was barely a decade younger than Angel - he was old and strong - and fuelled by grief and burning hatred. He landed every blow, responded to every punch in kind. Nothing seemed to slow him down, nothing seemed to stop him. Angel was fighting all out, and still he was making no headway, as the other vampire tossed him around; smashing him against the floor, and the walls, and the pillars.

...

Upstairs, Fred heard the sound of voices. There was someone new in the hotel, she thought - not someone from Pylea - someone who had never travelled to another world, someone who belonged resolutely in this one. And he was talking to Angel. Angel. Now would be a good time to show him how brave she could be, show him that she had listened to what he said and was willing to take the steps to get better. She opened her door and crept down the landing. 'Angel?' she called out.

Her voice floated downstairs to where the two vampires were still sparring. 'I thought I heard company,' she said appearing by the balustrade. 'I came out of my room - small steps - like you said.' She couldn't see the King. That was good. She had picked a good time to try leaving her room, she thought to herself.

But then Angel appeared in the lobby beneath her. He had been locked in battle near the weapons cabinet, but on hearing her soft, Texan voice float through the air, he pushed James away from himself and ran to the centre of the foyer, where he would be visible from the landing. He looked up at the tiny, lost little woman who had chosen this moment, of all moments, to try and be brave. 'Fred - go back to your room and stay there!' he commanded her.

Her hopeful expression faltered. 'Oh - OK then,' and she turned to scuttle back to her room. Maybe the handsome man didn't want her around company yet - maybe he didn't think she was ready - she'd probably just embarrass herself, anyways - or him. She shut her door, and picked up the marker and began to write on the walls once more - listening for the click that would make everything clear and make her brain work the way it used to.

...

James launched himself at Angel once more, knocking the vampire off his feet yet again.

* * *

'I don't know where he is now,' Merl was telling the others. 'But I know where he was going. Same place your half breed friend's been asking about - Dr. Gregson's.'

'A doctor?' Gunn asked, 'what kind?'

'The demon kind,' Lorne told him, 'he's a slod demon.'

'Slod demon?' asked Wesley - he had heard what the stool pigeon had said - had intimated about Doyle - but he didn't understand. And he didn't understand why Doyle and this heart broken vampire would go to see the same doctor. 'What does he do?' he wanted to know.

'Anything you ask of him,' Lorne told him, 'he's a collector.'

This was worrying news. Gunn took out his cell in order to ring the Hyperion for a second time.

* * *

The phone was ringing, but things were a bit busy down in the lobby for anyone to answer at that exact moment. Angel was still fighting. His technique was better than James' - but the other vampire was fuelled by hatred and raw grief - it made him stronger. It made him keep getting up, even when the blows were so hard they should knock him out cold. Angel was using everything he knew, throwing everything he had into this fight; he punched, he span and kicked out, knocking James backwards, he jumped off the sofa and landed on top of the other vampire, he jumped to cling onto the chandelier and propelled himself forward so he kicked James across the room. Nothing was working.

James was back up, and he had Angel by the throat. Cordelia picked up the fire extinguisher and hurled it at the back of the vampire's head. She was a good shot, and it hit him, knocking him away from his opponent. Angel straightened back up and glared at her, 'I told you to…'

Cordelia rolled behind the counter, she grabbed the stake she kept in her desk drawer and tossed it towards the complaining vampire. 'Just shut up and stake him,' she said. But this time, she was less lucky. James got in between her and her friend, and intercepted the stake mid air. He then brandished it at the man he had come here to kill. 'Oops!' Cordelia said, and ran out from behind the desk to rectify her mistake.

James was trying to bury the stake deep into Angel's chest, and it was taking all the vampire's strength to hold him off and keep him at arm's length. 'You never loved anything,' James snarled at him, lunging in for the kill, 'go to hell!'

Cordelia jumped on his back and tried to yank him away from her friend. He was much too strong for her; but it did offer Angel a moment's respite, as James pulled away from him in order to fling Cordy across the room. She went flying, and crashed down onto the lobby floor with a loud thump. As James was distracted, Angel grabbed the stake from his grip and buried it into the other vampire's chest, plunging it straight into his heart. Then he abandoned the fight, and ran over to where Cordy lay.

She was picking herself up off the floor, bruised and beaten - but at least nothing was broken. He began to help her get to her feet. 'It's alright,' he said to her, as he helped her up, 'it's alright - it's all over.'

But behind him, James had not exploded in a cloud of dust and, as the pair of them straightened up, they noticed the other vampire also getting to his feet. He pulled the stake out of his chest. 'Uh - over in what sense?' Cordelia asked. The two of them looked on in horror, as James' chest wound healed up and vanished before their very eyes.


	4. Heartthrob: Part Four

The doctor was still talking, but Doyle wasn't really listening to him anymore. He was trying to work out where the closest demon dive bar would be. It couldn't be far - he figured. It made sense to have a demon bar close to a demon hospital. Depressed demons going for a drink after getting bad news, getting into a fight, and then having to return to the clinic to be patched up. They probably worked in tandem, creating a steady stream of clients for each other. He would be able to find it quickly enough. And then he would order himself a whisky. He'd neck it down and have another straight away, and when that didn't hit the spot - he'd go for a third.

No. He wouldn't, he suddenly corrected himself. He had promised Cordelia that he would go straight back to the hotel and tell her what had happened. Straight back. Not via any bars or bottle shops. And he owed it to her to not be three sheets to the wind when he gave her the news that she would never be a mother - not if she stayed with him, anyway. If it wasn't for the promise she had extracted from him, he'd go and crawl into the bottom of a bottle of liquor and fall into his pit of despair - just like in the old days. But he had promised. So he would have to go to her first. And maybe she might stop him from heading off to get drunk afterwards. Maybe she could save him from himself after all.

He shook his head and sighed - she deserved more than that. She deserved better than this - than him. But for whatever stubborn reasons of her own - she had decided it was him that she wanted. So he would keep his promise and try to be good enough for her. As if he could ever be good enough for Cordelia… even when he was a King and she was a slave girl - kept safe only by his protection, he still hadn't been good enough for her. But she didn't see it that way, she insisted in seeing the best in him - whatever that was. So he would do his best to be the man she naively believed him to be. No bar. No whisky. No drowning his sorrows. Just home, an adult conversation, and then… he wasn't sure what then. The rest of his life, he supposed, whatever that might bring.

Dr. Gregson had stopped talking, and was holding his hand out to shake Doyle's. The half demon took it. 'I really am sorry it wasn't better news, Mr. Doyle,' the doctor said to him. Doyle nodded, mutely. 'And apologies again for the delay - we had some unexpected surgery you see. Some great eternal love gone wrong, or something. I truly didn't have to expect to fit cutting a vampire's heart out, so he could wreak a bloody revenge, into my schedule.'

Doyle's head snapped up. ' _What?'_

* * *

Angel launched himself back at James. He threw him around, and then kicked him hard in the chest - sending him flying through the glass doors and out into the sun filled courtyard. The vampire tumbled to the ground, in a patch of light, and Angel turned back to Cordelia. But she was pointing outwards, 'ah - shouldn't he be on fire?' She was right. As a creature of the night, James should have immolated the moment he came into contact with the sun's deadly rays, but instead he was picking himself up and brushing himself off. The sunlight shone down on him, as harmless as if he were human.

Angel took one look at him, and then grabbed Cordelia and hustled her down into the basement. 'Come on,' he said to her, pulling her along. He couldn't stay here and fight - he'd killed James twice now and twice the vampire had got back up and kept on going. Eventually, Angel would lose - so he opted to run instead - but he needed to go downwards, away from the light.

He led Cordy through the basement and down into the sewers. They climbed down the ladder into the tunnels, and looked around when they got to the bottom. He dragged her onward, until they reached a fork. Angel pushed his friend down one of them and told her to head off. 'What are you going to do?' she asked

'Just go!'

She ran on down the tunnel, and once he was alone, Angel sliced his hand open on the jagged walls and then splashed his blood down the opposite tunnel. The droplets landed on the walls and the floor, the iron tang clinging to the air even over the stink of the sewer. Then, careful not to spill anymore blood, Angel followed Cordelia down the tunnel she had taken.

He found a doorway in the walls - one of the access tunnels for the people who worked on the underground trains. 'Cordy - this way - hurry up!' he called to her, keeping his voice hushed - like a stage whisper. She hurried back to him, and they both squeezed through the door and into the space behind.

'OK,' she said, 'I've been doing this for a while now. Don't stakes through the heart and sunshine kill you guys?'

'Sh!' Angel said to her, trying to get her to keep her voice down. He was straining his ears for any sound of James approaching. But he knew the other vampire would have equally excellent hearing and would be able to track the sound of Cordelia's voice - along with her heart beat. 'He seems to have become…'

'Invincible?' she finished.

'Well let's not exaggerate!'

'The ring of Amara!' Cordelia said suddenly, remembering an adventure from nearly two years ago - when she and Doyle had spent the night hiding together from Spike, only to find out he had kidnapped their boss and was having the living hell tortured out of him at an abandoned warehouse. 'When you had that you were invincible!' and more terrifyingly, so too was the torture demon when he wore it. 'Does he have a ring?' she asked. She didn't recall seeing one one on James' finger.

'No.' Angel replied, shortly.

'Hmmm,' there had to be an answer. 'Did the Amara people make cufflinks or belt buckles?'

'There was only one.'

'And you had to smash it!' she hissed, annoyed at his younger self's lack of foresight.

'Why don't we recriminate later, OK?'

'Yes,' she wouldn't be forgetting this.

'Now be quiet, I think he took the bait.'

She forced herself to be quiet, holding her breath and willing her heart to thump a little less wildly in her chest. But her stillness was disturbed by a deep rumbling noise which echoed through the tunnels, reverberating around the walls and making them shake. She shrieked and clung onto Angel. 'Earthquake!' she yelped.

Even in this straightened situation, Angel enjoyed the warmth and closeness of her as she clung to him for protection. He couldn't help but smile at her misplaced fear - though he quickly put her right. 'Subway!'

'Oh OK,' she let go of him, and he missed her right away, 'just subway.' He shushed her again, trying to keep her quiet as they were hunted by this unstoppable killer. But they both jumped, as her cell phone began to ring.

* * *

Doyle marched out of the doctor's office, his cell phone in hand ready to ring Cordelia and warn her of the danger she was in. But out in the waiting room, he bumped into Wesley and Gunn, who were marching in the other direction. 'Doyle!'

'Wes!'

'What are you doing here?' they both asked at the same time.

'This is where that James cat was headed, after he found out who killed his girl,' Gunn told the half demon.

Doyle nodded. 'I know - I saw him - I just didn't know it was him,' and he quickly filled the guys in on what the doctor had told him.

Wesley immediately took his phone out and tried the hotel. When he got no answer, he dialled Cordy's cell.

'He's headed straight for Angel,' Gunn said. 'And even the dark avenger, himself, might not be able to stop him.'

'He was at the hotel when I left,' Doyle told him, '...with Cordelia.' He closed his eyes, for a moment as he thought of her. She had wanted to come with him today. She could have been here, at the clinic, safe - with him. Instead he had insisted that he come alone - and so had left her right where a psycho unkillable vampire would find her. He prayed that she would be safe. That James would leave her alone and just go for Angel… but if she wasn't picking up at the hotel, then that suggested she had already had to run for safety.

At least running away from unspeakable demons wasn't anything new for Cordelia. Today probably wouldn't even make it onto her Richter scale of awful things that had happened to her. Provided she survived, of course.

'Angel won't let nothin' happen to your girl, man - don't sweat it,' Gunn said, seeing Doyle's face and interpreting his thoughts correctly. The street fighter then glanced around the waiting room. 'But what were you doing here in the first place, man?'

'Uh…' he hadn't told Cordelia the news yet, so he was hardly going to share it with anyone else. And he hadn't mentioned anything to the guys at all - he probably wasn't ever going to. It wasn't their business and they would only pity him. 'I can't go to regular doctors can I? On account of the whole half demon thing. This is the place I have to come if I need anythin'.' He shrugged, trying to make it sound casual - like he was just here for a checkup.

'But you're OK, right? You're not sick?' Gunn looked worried, and his concern made Doyle feel better about himself.

'No, bud, I'm not sick.' _Just infertile_ \- he thought to himself. But the way the street fighter seemed eager to check that Doyle was the picture of health reminded the half demon that he wasn't alone. Even if Cordelia ended up leaving him - he wouldn't end up the way he had last time. He had friends now. He would just join the other sad, loveless men that made up Angel Investigations…

By this time, Wesley had managed to reach Cordelia on her cell. The other two men stopped their conversation in order to listen in.

'Cordelia is that you?' Wesley asked. He was having trouble hearing her, the line was all crackly as if her signal were poor. 'There's something you need to know about James.'

* * *

Deep in the sewers, Cordelia scrunched her face up as she tried to concentrate on what her associate was telling her. His voice kept fading out, because she was so far underground, and it was taking all her effort to understand him. 'Oh… invincible huh?' she gave Angel an 'I told you so' look. The vampire shrugged. But the conversation was continuing. 'He went to what?' she was asking, 'a slog demon - what's that?' The answer made her frown again, and she repeated what she had heard to Angel, 'some kind of demon doctor that collects rare organs.'

She spoke back into the phone, 'cut out his heart?' and then back to Angel, 'absolutely cannot be killed,' she hissed. Angel sighed - there was always something. 'Wait- what? How long?' the line was crackling again, and Cordy had the phone pushed as tight against her ear as she could in order to hear. She brought her left hand up to her other ear to help block out any other sounds. 'Six what? What? Hello?' she looked at her phone - no signal. The line had gone dead so she snapped the cell shut. 'OK' she said to Angel, 'bad news - the guy's invincible - the good news - it only lasts so long and then he dies.'

'How long?'

But she didn't have an answer to that - it was the information she had been unable to hear. Six something - minutes, hours, days, weeks… she didn't know. She fumbled with her cell phone - holding it up as high as she could in attempt to regain signal and call Wesley back. But Angel was feeling the first tinges of relief. The invincibility was only temporary. 'This is good news,' he said to his office manager, 'all we have to do is wait him out.'

'Right,' she agreed, 'so we just wait here until we're sure.'

BAM one of the doors further down was kicked in, and there was James - marching towards them. Maybe he heard their voices, maybe he had sensed Cordelia's heart… or maybe he had never been fooled by the false trail of blood in the first place. Angel pushed his friend back into the tunnels, and pulled her along with him.

* * *

'I don't know that she heard everything,' Wesley was telling the others, 'but I think she heard enough. She knows he's invincible at least… and that it won't last forever.'

'Where was she? Did she sound OK?' her worried boyfriend wanted to know.

'Well - she was still alive - and able to answer a phone… she appeared to be with Angel.'

'See - she'll be safe, man,' Gunn said to the half demon, 'tall, dark and vampire's got her back.'

But Doyle didn't find this quite as reassuring as Gunn had meant it to be. Cordelia wasn't James' target. He wasn't interested in her - he didn't even know who she was. It was Angel he was hunting down, relentlessly. If Cordelia were not with him, then she wouldn't be in any danger at all - as it was, she risked being caught in the crossfire.

'We have to trust Angel will protect her - and be able to handle himself,' Wesley said to them both, seeing that Doyle's anxious grimace was not lightening up. 'As long as they can hide for long enough, James will simply die. Even Angel will see the merit in staying hidden, and not fighting for once… in the meantime - I suggest we return to the hotel and wait for them. If they have left the Hyperion it means James has probably tracked them down there… someone ought to check on Fred.'

* * *

The pair of them raced on through the tunnels, before crashing through another access door. This one led them out into a subway station - after a few twists and turns, and the two of them joined the crowds of commuters. They ran up the escalator and out onto the platform. But James was just behind them. He stormed his way up the down escalator, pushing people out of his way as he advanced.

Just as he reached the platform, a train pulled up - and Angel pushed Cordelia inside with the other people. James ran to catch them - but the glass doors slid shut right in his face. The train pulled away from the station, and Cordelia stuck her tongue out at the thwarted vampire. 'What a creep,' she said.

Down on the platform, James morphed out of vamp face and then… as the last car passed him, he jumped out and caught hold of the door rail.

'So - should we get off at the next station?' Cordelia was wondering, 'double back? He won't be expecting that...or should we go right the way to the end of the line? Put as much distance between us and him as possible?'

But Angel wasn't listening to her, he had his face turned upwards towards the ceiling. He flung an arm out to caution her, 'shh' he whispered.

Cordelia also turned to look upwards, and as she did she thought she heard …. 'He couldn't possibly..' she began to say.

James came bursting through the window at the end of the compartment, and Angel thrust Cordelia behind himself, protecting her from the flying glass shards. 'Get back,' he yelled at her, trying to block her from the other vampire's view with his body.

James raised an eyebrow. 'Well this is a new twist in an old snake,' he said, 'can it be that you care about someone who isn't you?'

Angel glanced back at Cordy, regretting more than ever that she had stayed by his side - and that he had drawn attention to her by shielding her from the vampire. 'Don't worry about her,' he said. It was him James had come to kill - and he was going to make sure that there would be no collateral damage - especially not if that damage was to Cordelia.

'But if you've changed…' James said to him, he almost smiled as he tried to comprehend the difference in his old sire - as he realised that maybe there was a chance he could make Angelus hurt as he, James, was hurting - that he wouldn't just have to settle for killing him. 'If you aren't the same man who screwed Darla and couldn't care less what happened to her…'

'Where did you hear about…?' Angel's prominent brow lowered in consternation, and then raised again as he realised …' oh - you mean back in the day. Right...'

'He has changed!' Cordelia stepped forward, anxious to make James see that her friend was not the man that this other vampire had known - that the man he was trying to kill no longer existed. 'A lot. He has a soul now and he cares about people.' She hoped that if she could just get this unkillable vampire to understand that Angel knew what it was like to hurt, to love… that he might back off and leave them alone.

'So you might feel something when I snap her neck?'

Her mistake - time to backpedal. 'Well it's not like he's losing sleep with the caring… and me? I'm just his sidekick's girlfriend... We're barely acquaintances … honest.'

But James ignored her. 'You love this human, Angelus?' he asked. Angel didn't answer, he just stared the other vampire down. 'Then you will know how I feel now that you have killed my Elizabeth, when I kill her in front of you.'

Angel forced Cordelia further back, 'I already know how you feel, James,' He told the heartbroken vampire, 'I've already lost _my_ Elizabeth.'

James looked confused, he glanced between Angelus - and the woman he was trying so desperately to shield. If this was not the woman he loved then…'what are you talking about?'

'It happened about three months ago,' it was the human girl who answered. Perhaps Angelus was not lying when he claimed this woman was not his… but…

'We try not to say her name too much,' Cordelia continued.

' _You_ loved someone with all your heart?' He couldn't believe it, if Angelus had never cared for Darla, how could he be so very changed now?

'Yeah,' Angel told him, still staring him down.

'No - you didn't. Because if you had you wouldn't be standing here, playing games with me. You wouldn't be able to - because once she'd died, or some bastard killed her, it would have killed everything in you.'

'I wouldn't be able to go on living.'

'Don't worry,' James ripped a seat loose from the wall, 'you won't have to.' He smashed it across Angel's face. Then he swung again, and Angel stumbled backwards, towards Cordelia and another passenger - an elderly man on crutches. 'Catch him,' he yelled at his friend.

'What?'

But, without answering, Angel whipped the crutches out from under the man and used them to attack his opponent. The man began to topple, and Cordelia caught him in her arms, staggering with the sudden weight of him.

Angel now had a crutch under each arm and he was holding them outwards, keeping James at a distance. He used one of his makeshift weapons to flip the other vampire away, and push him against the wall of the carriage. 'Is this your idea of love, James, it's not real unless it kills you?'

The invincible vampire had stopped fighting back, in fact he seemed to be becoming unsteady on his feet. 'What's yours? It's fun as long it doesn't cost you anything? You don't know what love is!' He suddenly slid down the wall, and slumped to the floor. He looked up at Angel, scowling, but unable to get back to his feet. 'You think you've won?' he asked, 'because you're still alive? I _lived_ \- you just existed.' And then he felt the pain in his chest, the empty cavity closing in around his missing heart.

As Angel and Cordelia stared down at him, James slowly crumbled to dust. His time was spent, he had not avenged Elizabeth, but at least he would be with her now.

* * *

By the time Angel and Cordy made it back to the hotel, the guys were already there. They looked up as the door opened, and Doyle's face took on an expression of relief as he saw his girlfriend returned to him, unharmed. 'You're alright?'

The pair of them both nodded. Angel looked up the stairs. 'How's Fred?' he asked.

'I think she had a bit of a fright,' Wesley told him, 'she isn't answering her door.'

'I'll go talk to her,' he sank down onto the sofa, 'once I've got the feeling back in my legs.. You know, fighting unkillable vampires really takes a lot of you?'

Gunn clapped him on the back, 'but you're still the reigning champ,' he said.

Over by the counter, Cordelia shot Doyle an inquisitive look. He didn't speak, but he shook his head, and then stared down at his shoes. He felt her take his hand. 'Let's go upstairs,' she said to him.

Still on the sofa, Angel frowned as he saw his two friends head upstairs, alone, together, in the middle of the afternoon. But he didn't say anything... And after a while, he forced himself up to go and speak to Fred.

* * *

'So, it was bad news, huh?' The young couple were locked in Doyle's room - and the Irishman had yet to say anything… so Cordelia realised she was going to be forced to have another one of those talks where she did most of the talking.

He nodded his head, 'yeah.'

'Well - what did he say?'

'Apart from that I can't have children - does it matter?'

'Not to me,' she wrapped her arms around him, 'but it might make you feel better to talk about it.'

He allowed himself to lean into her, and rested his head on her shoulder. 'I don't wanna - it won't change anythin'... I just … I don't know what happens now.'

Cordelia chuckled, 'nothing!' she said to him, 'nothing happens now - Doyle - I'm not yet twenty one! I don't want a baby!'

'Not yet.'

'No - not yet - and in, like, _ten_ years time if we're both still alive - and somehow we're not battling the forces of darkness every night… _and_ we've managed to get some money somehow... if after _all tha_ t, we decide we want children _then_ we can talk about this - look at our options. But for me, we can put a pin in this until 2011, at least!'

'Options? What options do we have? I mean you do - you can leave, but…'

'No,' she said again, 'that isn't one of the options on the table - but we can foster, or adopt or … or get a donor.'

'What, you mean like ask Wesley?'

'Well not _Wesley_!' She sounded appalled at the very idea. 'But they have banks for this kind of thing,' she kissed him, 'we could even go to an Irish one if you like, so our baby would be half Irish still.'

'Do you really mean all this?' he asked her, 'you're not just pitying me?'

'I'm the nastiest girl in Sunnydale history,' she told him, 'I don't do pity - besides I'm pretty jazzed at the idea of how much money I'm gonna save on birth control.'

Doyle frowned, 'you're gonna give up on that?'

'Well apparently I don't need it.'

'Yeah but... You've managed to get impregnated with demon spawn every year that I've known you. Maybe don't give up on it yet, yeah? Better safe than sorry, I'm thinkin'!' He smiled at her, then, to show her he was joking - and she began to laugh. And then he began to laugh. And they stayed together, wrapped up in each others arms, talking things over - and kissing - for a good long while. And Doyle had to admit - there were worse ways to end your day… and drowning your own self pity in alcohol, alone, in a demon dive bar, was one of them.

* * *

Angel sat on the stairs and played with the golden locket he had taken from Elizabeth. He heard a noise behind him, and looked up - it was Cordelia - coming down from Doyle's room. 'Doyle still upstairs?' he asked, 'is he OK?'

She smiled at him, then, that big, bright smile she had given him that morning when he asked where the half demon was going - as if she was trying too hard to cover something up. 'Yeah - he's fine - he just found an episode of 'The Price is Right' that he hasn't seen. He won't disturb us.'

Her last words made Angel's insides feel funny, but he kept his face impassive. 'I didn't know Doyle liked 'The Price is Right'.'

'Oh - yeah - big, big Bob Barker fan.' She sat down beside the vampire. 'So how was she?'

'Fred? Yeah … we talked over what happened and … I think she'll be coming out of her room any decade now.'

'Uhuh, and how about you?'

'I'm O..'

'And don't say OK, Angel, please.' She interrupted. 'I know you. Ever since you've come back from your grief trip, I can tell that something's not right.' Despite himself, Angel looked alarmed - had she realised…? But, even though she was having a deep and meaningful conversation with him, Cordelia was too wrapped up in her own words to notice the disquiet of the vampire… she hadn't noticed anything… 'and - and obviously, it's not,' she was saying, 'Buffy's - dead. And I don't mean to diminish that - I miss her too. I just wanna say - that with all his Romeo and Juliet madness, I know James has opened up a lot of wounds for you, but you'll be OK.'

'I am OK.'

Cordelia looked confused, 'then what's the problem?'

'That I'm OK,' he admitted. 'That losing Buffy didn't kill me. That I could deal with it. In all those years - nothing ever mattered - not like she did. And now she's gone - forever.'

'And you're still here.'

'I feel like I'm betraying her,' he told Cordelia. But she was adamant that this was not the case. Giving up, giving into his grief - that would be betraying Buffy. But carrying on her fight, continuing her work, saving the world she was sworn to protect? That was honouring her.

'You think?' he asked her.

'This is the second time in two days I've had to say this to a demon doofus - I'm Cordelia Chase, I don't think - I know.' She grinned at him - her brilliant thousand kilowatt grin, and he managed a small smile in return. He couldn't tell her about his other betrayal of Buffy - about the other truth he had found deep inside himself, as he meditated with the monks ... before they started trying to kill him, that was.

...

The doors opened and Wes and Gunn strode in. They had found another bunch of nester demons. The four of them had cleared them out of Hancock park during the summer- but they hadn't got the queen and now the place was infested worse than ever. Cordelia ran to get Doyle, and then - each one of them bearing a dagger - the five of them left the hotel and set to work.

* * *

As night fell over the Hyperion hotel, Doyle found himself falling asleep much easier than he had the night before. Cordelia was right - as if she wasn't always - the hardest part had been the not knowing. And she was right, too - it was too early for them to worry too much about what his news would mean for their future. They weren't there yet, anyway - they wouldn't be for years - if ever. If he could just hold it together now - whilst the pain was raw - then maybe he would get through this, and move on - and manage not to lose everything like he had last time. He rolled over, so that he had the sleeping Cordy wrapped tightly in both his arms. Maybe his nights like this didn't have to be numbered, after all - if they could just keep things going, keep busy… then this would just become a part of their lives together, like the half demon stuff, and it would fade in importance. Maybe the universe would finally let him catch a break, fix it so nothing got in their way, let them have their happily ever after…

* * *

...But down in Nicaragua, the universe continued to roll the dice - setting the next play in motion. A man drew up outside a cantina and went inside. The woman was waiting for him in there, he sat down beside her and took out a piece of paper. 'Sorry it took so long,' he said to her, 'he's a very difficult shaman to find.'

Darla took the paper from him, and shoved it down the front of her top. 'You can go, ' she said to the man.

But he had other ideas, and poured himself a drink. 'No no no - I thought we'd have a drink to celebrate.'

'No thanks.'

'Oh don't be so shy, little one,' he said, 'you get to know me - I'm a very nice man. How much can one little drink hurt, huh?'

She smiled, then - a dangerous smile - although he did not heed it. 'Depends on who's doing the drinking.'

'Hmm - I thought you might have a surprise or two in you,' he said.

'Well - you know what they say.' She vamped out and bit down hard on his neck, he yelped and she dropped him to the floor, before picking up a wedge of lemon and sucking on it. 'Life's full of surprises.'

Then she got down from her bar stool, and left the cantina, cradling her round, heavy pregnancy bump as she walked.

* * *


	5. That Vision Thing: Part One

Wes and Gunn stood at the counter, eating their Chinese takeout straight out of the boxes. Across the lobby, on the round sofa, Cordelia and Doyle were similarly occupied. The pair of them had seemed quieter than normal over the past few weeks and their two associates were beginning to notice - and worry. 'You think it's bad?' Gunn asked in a low voice, 'I mean - we're not imagining it, right? They are different?'

'We're not - they are… but if it was that serious - wouldn't they tell us?'

'I dunno, man… what was he doin' at that demon hospital, anyway?'

Although Doyle had assured his friends, at the time, that he was fine and there was nothing to worry about… they hadn't forgotten that they had bumped into him at the clinic, completely by accident - that he had been visiting demon doctors in secret. That had to mean something.

Becoming aware that they were the object of scrutiny, the young couple glanced over at where the two men stood staring at them.'Quick they're looking!' Wesley hissed, 'act casual!' The two of them fixed on bright smiles, and waved their chopsticks in greeting. Doyle and Cordy looked confused, waved back, and then turned back to each other.

'How d'y' think we did?' Gunn asked.

'I felt quite genuine.' The watcher looked back over at the half demon and his girlfriend. They were sat, cross legged, on the sofa; facing each other. Even as he watched them, Doyle reached out with his chopsticks and fed some of his takeout to Cordy. The pair of them obviously weren't that bothered by the scrutiny they found themselves under. 'I don't think they noticed anything,' he said.

'B plus, C minus.' A voice floated out to them. The two men turned. Fred was sitting under one of the desks behind the counter; eating her own takeout and looking at them, appraising their performance.

Wesley smiled and went over to her, crouching down so he was on her level. 'Fred, if you feel comfortable grading our sincerity - how about joining us for the rest of the meal? Isn't that the point of coming downstairs?'

Fred swallowed, hard, 'just the two of you, though, right? Not... I guess I could do that.' She crawled out from under the table and Wesley helped her to her feet. Once at the counter, she began to eat her Chinese with her fingers.

Gunn watched her for a while and then spoke up. 'Ah - I don't wanna rush you into the twenty first century or anything - but how about using some chopsticks?' He clacked his own chopsticks at her, 'or how about a fork - you remember those right?' He picked one up and offered it to her.

After a moment, she took it. 'Sure - how could I forget? Fork, pitch fork, fork it over, fork in the road - one I'm not ready to take yet...'

The two men smiled at her, trying to conceal their confusion and look reassuring. As she pushed her fork down into her noodles, they both turned and looked back at Doyle. 'Of course there are many reasons a half man might need to go to a demon doctor,' Wesley said, 'and not all of them life and death.'

'But he has been different since we saw him there,' Gunn replied, 'Cordelia too - whatever it is - she knows.'

'Of course she knows - whatever he's hiding from us, he would never hide from her - they have no secrets.'

Back on the sofa, the lovers felt the unmistakable prickle of being watched. They turned to look at their friends, again. Once more, Wesley and Gunn beamed and waved at them. Fred looked vaguely embarrassed.

'OK - what gives?' Cordelia called across the room.

'What gives?' Wesley repeated back to her, sounding equally perplexed.

'I don't know what you're talkin' about,' Gunn said.

'I'm talking about the weirdness,' she told them, 'the total weirdness of you two and the way you keep staring at Doyle like he's gonna burst into flames or grow a second head or something. What gives?'

The two men stared at each other, in discomfort. And they had thought they were being so subtle! 'I - uh - we - uh - we were just -um wondering… uh - Doyle hasn't had a vision in a while and…'

Wesley was running out of excuses but, luckily for him, the man in question saw fit to interrupt. 'What? You're keepin' tabs on me? I gotta say, bud, I'm not exactly sorry that The Powers That Be haven't seen fit to curse me with a head splittin', mind cracking vision migraine for a few weeks. A breather is always appreciated, y'know?'

'Yes well still - uh - business is business.'

'Well I'll be sure to mention that to the higher powers, but right now I'm just enjoyin' the peace and quiet in my noggin.' He shook his head, in disbelief, and turned back to Cordelia - reaching out with his chopsticks, once again, to feed her some of his Lo Mein. But they were interrupted a second time.

'Excuse me.'

All five of them turned to look at the new comer. Gavin Park stood in the doorway, in his designer suit and tastefully expensive Gucci loafers. Both Cordelia and Wesley immediately scowled, when they saw him. Doyle looked surprised - he would have expected his girlfriend to respond well to an evidently wealthy person turning up at their door. Especially when business had been slow for a while. However, she appeared less than impressed.

'Get out,' she said to the suited man. Her boyfriend flashed her a bemused look. 'He's a lawyer,' she explained to him.

'With Wolfram and Hart,' Wesley added. 'This is Gavin Park - something of a new Lilah Morgan.'

'Are we finished with the old Lilah Morgan?' Doyle asked, 'that's good news… maybe this one won't have a personal vendetta against me.'

'Oh he better not, if he knows what's good for him,' Cordelia growled.

Gavin smiled pleasantly around the lobby, 'well - I'm pleased to finally meet those of you I haven't seen face to face, before. Mr Doyle, Mr. Gunn,' he inclined his head at the pair of them, and then raised an eyebrow at Fred, 'new player?' he asked.

Wesley stepped forward, so he was blocking the young woman from the lawyer's view. 'Well, now that we've had this lovely reintroduction - I suggest you piss off.'

Angel walked into the lobby through the glass doors that led out into the courtyard. He looked around the room - noting the attorney. 'Is there a problem?' he asked.

'No no,' Wesley replied. 'Mr. Park was just leaving.'

But Gavin had other ideas. He pulled some papers out of his briefcase and brandished them towards the vampire, 'here is a list of fifty seven city code violations for your hotel - including earthquake proofing, asbestos and termites.' He handed the papers to Angel, 'be advised I am filing a copy with the city planning office.'

'Fifty seven - gee - is that a lot?' asked Angel, his tone withering. But it didn't get through Gavin's thick hide. The lawyer maintained his pleasant smile, and then - papers delivered - turned to leave.

Cordelia watched him go, 'you know - there was a time when I would really go for a man in an expensive suit,' she said. Then she shuddered, 'I am so over that now, ugghh.'

Wesley moved back to the counter, no longer blocking Fred from view. Angel did a double take, when he saw her, and then looked pleased. 'Fred! Nice to see you out and about.'

She grinned in pleasure. 'It is, isn't it? Out and about - I've been forking with Gunn.'

The vampire looked at the street fighter with his eyebrows raised, and Gunn held his hands up to protest his innocence.

_BAM_ the group at the counter were interrupted by Doyle being suddenly thrown from the sofa by the force of his latest vision. His carton of Lo Mein was thrown all over, and his body twitched and fitted as he felt the images swarm into his mind. The others watched, helplessly, waiting for it to stop. He suddenly yelled out in agony, startling them; and then the pain of the message began to ebb away, and he sat back up, gasping for breath.

He seemed to wince as he pulled himself upright, and leaned against the the sofa - only to yank himself away from it as soon as he touched it, gasping again. 'What did you see?' Angel asked him.

Doyle brought his hands up and rubbed his forehead, he still seemed to be having some trouble - as if the movement was causing him extra pain. 'There was a coin,' he said, 'and some demons with big claws. It was in Chinatown - an herbalist's shop - though I don't know which one.'

'Right - we'll start looking into that.' Wesley and Gunn headed to get the books.

'It's about the coin,' the half demon told his vampire friend, 'y' have to get the coin.'

'I will - are you OK?' His always prominent brow lowered as he noted that his friend still seemed stiff and sore.

'Uh - yeah - I'm fine…' Doyle glanced upward and made eye contact with Cordelia. 'Could I talk to you alone for a moment?'

She nodded and helped him up, and he led her over to the bathroom. He ushered her inside and locked the door. Angel watched them go, a pensive expression on his face.

* * *

Inside the bathroom, Doyle switched on the light, and then turned to look at his girlfriend.

'What is it?' she asked.

'OK, Cordy, I need you not to freak out, OK?'

'OK...'

'Promise?'

'Yeah - Doyle, what is it?'

He lifted his shirt, and the tank top he wore beneath it, exposing the bare skin off his midriff. Cordelia stared.

There was a sudden knocking at the door, and they both jumped and looked towards it. 'Uh - Doyle?' it was Wesley. 'The demon you saw - did it have five claws or four?'

'Five,' Doyle replied, instantly.

'You're certain?'

Cordelia stared down at her boyfriend's body - at the five bright red gouges that were scratched deep into his skin. 'He's certain,' she said.

* * *

Wesley returned to his table laden with books, and began to peruse the tomes - scanning for any mentions of five clawed beasts - particularly in conjunction with either coins or the Far East. But ID-ing demons was a slow process - and they needed to move.

Fred paced up and down behind him, her nose was buried in the phone book. He glanced over his shoulder to speak with her. 'Did you find anything of interest yet?'

'Oh sure,' she grinned, 'H is a fascinating letter; helicopters, helium, helmets hernias.'

'Did you happen to notice 'herbs' in your wanderings?'

'I did.' She resumed her reading, tracing her finger down the page as she scanned listings for hospitals, hydro tanks and health spas. Wesley waited, patiently - not taking his eyes off her - and eventually she realised. 'Oh right! There are five herbalist shops in Chinatown.'

Angel appeared beside them, weaponed up. 'We got a name or face for these things yet?'

'Circling,' Wesley told him, 'I think we might be looking at a Wan Shan Dhole or a Cantonese Fook Beast.'

'I say we figure out what this thing is when we find that coin,' Gunn said to the group - also appearing bearing weapons. He had a baseball bat, with a sharpened end, and carried a rucksack on his back. 'We're burning moonlight.'

Wesley was inclined to agree. Whatever it was - a slice and dice usually did the job. They needed to find that coin. There was time to work out what was going on after the artefact was safely in their possession.

* * *

'You need to tell them - show them!' Cordelia had helped Doyle take his shirt off and they were now examining three further claw marks that were scratched across his shoulder. Like the ones on his front, they were deep and red and angry. The half demon had had to contort himself, twist around so that he could view these other marks in the mirror. But he twisted back at Cordy's words.

'No - I'm not showing them.'

'Why the heck not?'

He shrugged. He wasn't sure why not, if he was honest. He just knew he wanted to keep this a secret - just between him and Cordelia. He knew the others would want to know, and he knew the marks were bad enough that they wouldn't think he was fussing over nothing. But maybe that was it - they'd be appalled if they saw what the latest vision had done to him. He'd be able to see the look of horror and worry in their eyes… and that would make it harder for him to deal with. He couldn't pretend it was nothing - not worth freaking out over - if he could see all his friends freaking out.

Plus - they'd feel sorry for him. And he didn't want that. Part of the fussing would be making sure his wounds were tended to - and then they'd treat him like he was injured, like he couldn't quite take care of himself. They would offer to do anything for him that required some kind of physical exertion - no matter how small - because he had been physically attacked by his visions. And it would last until he was healed - at least - the memory of it would linger much longer than that, make them all more wary about how he was doing, as they went forward. It would come from a place of love, but it would make him feel weak. It was bad enough being the shortest man in the outfit by a good six inches - as well as the least toned - without also being treated like some wilting, fragile flower that might expire if put under any type of stress.

But his shrug was not enough to convince Cordelia. 'Look - this is important, this could mean something - the guys have to know… if we're gonna stop it then -'

'What if we're not meant to stop it?' Doyle interrupted her. She looked confused. Doyle twisted himself back around so he could look at his shoulder in the mirror again. 'What if this is just the next stage o' my visions? If it's part of my punishment? My redemption? Maybe this is just what's gonna happen from now on.'

' _Are you insane?'_ Cordelia gasped, 'this,' she indicated the gouge marks, 'is not redemption. This is not atonement. This is being attacked by invisible claws that are attached to a monster half a city away - just because you saw them in your head. This is...just think of some of the other stuff you see! What? Next time you see someone get decapitated, is your head just gonna roll off? We can't just leave this and hope it goes away!'

'Fine,' Doyle nodded, but he was reluctant. 'We'll tell them - after they've killed the demon and got the coin.' Cordelia opened her mouth to argue, but he cut her off before she could get a word out. 'That's my only offer, Cordy. We tell them later - or we don't tell them at all. And I'm not showin' them.'

'Why not?'

'I just don't want them to see.'

'But - '

'What are you gonna do? Pin me down and force my shirt off in front of them? I'm not showin' them Cordy. I'll tell them - and maybe Wes can work somethin' out with his books. But for now this is private, yeah? Strictly between you and me.'

...

There was another knock on the door. Doyle hastily pulled his shirt on, wincing as the material brushed against his fresh cuts. 'Are you guys OK in there?' This time it was Angel.

'Yeah, we're fine, man.'

'Doyle - the vision - are you still in pain?'

'O' course not, I'm right as rain.'

Cordelia gave him a look, but he ignored her and concentrated on lying to his friend.

'You guys gonna come out of there anytime soon?'

...

There was a click, as the door was unlocked, and Angel took a step back. It was the half demon that stepped out of the bathroom first, though Cordelia was close behind. They both looked OK - the vampire couldn't work out what the problem was. 'We're gonna go out and hit up the herbalist shops in Chinatown,' Angel said to them, 'we'll bring that coin back - are you sure you guys are fine?'

'Never better.'

The Irishman was lying - and Angel knew it. But both halves of the young couple seemed determined to keep their secret - whatever it was, and so there was nothing he could do. He shrugged and pretended to believe his friend. 'OK - well, Wes was thinking this demon might be a Wan Shan Dhole, or a Cantonese Fook Beast. Could you guys carry on the research party whilst we're out? Maybe look on the net - see if you can find any link to a coin, and what it's used for. We should be back soon enough.'

'Sure thing,' Doyle agreed. Angel nodded and walked away, but stopped when his friend called out to him. 'Hey, bud, I don't know if it's important - but the coin you're lookin' for has got a hole in the middle of it.'

'Check - one bagel shaped coin coming straight up.'

The three men left, and Doyle glanced around the seemingly empty lobby. 'Cordelia? You got anythin' that you could rub onto my scratch marks, darlin'? They really sting.'

* * *

The convertible was barrelling through the streets of Chinatown - and Gunn was grousing as he drove. There were five herbalist shops in the area, they had already hit up four. Why was it that whatever they were searching for was always in the last place they looked?

'Just one of the unwritten laws of being a "dick" I suppose,' Wesley told him. Gunn threw a dark look in his direction, and the watcher hastened to explain his words, 'a sleuth, a gumshoe, a Sherlock.'

'All I know is, you use the word "dick" again and we're gonna have a problem,' the street fighter retorted. He turned left and slowed down, scanning the store fronts to find which was the one they wanted.

Wesley turned to Angel, who was sitting in the back, and asked how Doyle had been when the vampire had spoken to him. 'He said everything was fine… he's gonna keep on researching the demon he saw.'

'Did you believe him?'

'No - there's something he's not telling us.'

'Our thoughts exactly,' Wesley agreed, indicating himself and Gunn.

'Safe to say, all is not well in Ireland,' the street fighter said to his friends, as he stopped the car. 'But damned if we can do anything about it if he won't talk to us… anyway, here we are. Next time we're hitting the last place first.'

...

The three of them entered the herbalist shop. An older, white haired man was behind the counter, measuring out some powder. An elderly woman, his wife, was bringing him a jar to pour it into. She looked up as the three men entered and then pointed. 'You're kind not welcome here!'

'Since when can't a brother buy some ginseng tea?' Gunn wanted to know.

But, the old man shook his head, 'not you, him!' he pointed at Angel. 'Vampire not welcome!'

'This is a public facility and any being may enter,' Wesley informed them, We're looking for an ancient coin.'

The elderly couple glanced at each other, and then both let out a piercing, eldritch scream and somersaulted over the counter; landing on their feet to face down the three men. Gunn looked unimpressed, 'you think some fancy flipping and a little hollering can intimidate guys like us?' But as he spoke, the Chinese couple's hands suddenly extended out into the fearsome and razor sharp claws that Doyle had spoken about from his vision. The street fighter was forced to backtrack. 'OK - that creeps me out a little.'

'You two take Grandma, I'll take the old man,' Angel directed his friends - and they set to work. The two elderly Chinese demons were fierce fighters, and moved with an agility and speed which belied their age. But in the end Wesley was able to hit the old woman over the head, as Gunn kept her distracted with his baseball bat, and she collapsed to the floor, unconscious. At the same moment, Angel threw the old man through the air. He crashed into the shelving and slumped to the ground - also knocked out cold. 'Damn!' Gunn said, 'Grandma and Grandpa got game!'

'Yes, now if we can just find that coin before they come to,' Wesley said, beginning to search around in the remains of the store. But Angel had found something. Tied on a leather necklace, around the old man's neck, was an ancient looking coin - and just as the half demon had said, it had a hole right through the centre. He snapped the leather, and pocketed the coin and the three of them headed back to the car.

* * *

Lilah looked up, as her printer suddenly sprung into life and began to churn out paper. She frowned, she hadn't sent anything to print - so she headed over to scan the documents that were being sent through to her department. 'Asbestos disposal? What?' She frowned even deeper, lines appearing on her forehead, as she read the contents of the printing. The address on it was the Hyperion Hotel… this was somehow about Angel, but it made scant sense to her.

Gavin Park appeared behind her, and took the paper from her hand. 'I think that's mine. My printer is down so I had the I.T guy network me into yours.'

'Thanks for asking,' she replied drily, wondering why on earth a real estate lawyer would choose special projects as his go to printer when his was down. They didn't have a lot in common, as far as she could see, nor were the departments close by within the building.

But Gavin had news for her; what with all the karmically damaged buildings in the city, not to mention the demon infestations, The Senior Partners had decided to move him across to special projects. They felt his expertise would be of more use over there.

Lilah raised an eyebrow. _This_ was what she was getting? They had been talking about expanding the team and providing her with more support since Darla and Dru had eaten the rest of the team down in Holland Manners' wine cellar. She had needed someone to share the case load with her ever since Lindsey had upped sticks and joined the whitehats over a year ago… and now they were giving her a _real estate lawyer?_

But Gavin was grinning at her, a smile full of confidence and egotism. 'I'm working on a little something aimed at Angel Investigations,' he told her, 'if you're interested, I'd love to have you on my team.'

His team. _His team?_ How dare he! She had been working on Angel and his ragtag bunch of misfit friends for nearly two years now. She had driven Angel crazy and separated him from his friends, she had had his half breed sidekick locked up in prison, she had sacrificed _her own left hand_ to the cause of isolating Angel from The Powers That Be and then this - _this pen pusher_ \- this glorified surveyor - offers _her_ a place _on his team_ \- _like he was doing her a favour?_ 'Your team?' she asked him, the disbelief evident in her voice.

She was interrupted, then, by her office door opening. A small man, wearing a fez, poked his head out and gave her a look. 'I'll be right in,' she told him and then she turned back to Gavin. 'Let me tell you a little something about your team - you don't have one.'

The smile on his face faltered for a moment, and she smirked and began to walk away. 'Hey,' he called after her, 'just because they gave you Holland's old office doesn't mean…'

'I earned this office,' she said, whipping back round to face him. 'I've run special projects alone for the better part of the last year… I gave my hand - sacrificed my own flesh and blood for this company - for the Angel project. Fighting against the dark avenger - risked my life time and again as captain crusader waged his war against the Senior Partners - and me. And what have you got?' She lifted one of the printouts, 'building code violations.'

'I'm fighting Angel in my own way.'

'Oh yeah - I'm sure he's terrified.' And she turned on her heel and entered her office, slamming the door behind her.


	6. That Vision Thing: Part Two

Doyle was frowning at his computer. He was on the Demons Demons Demons database, and what he was looking at didn't make any sense. The leads Wesley had given him, the Wan Shan Dhole and the Fook Beast, had been red herrings - but he had found a link, embedded in the page dedicated to the Wan Shan Dhole, that had taken him through to a list of other demons of Chinese origin. There was one very likely looking demon - the Tongshi - or bronze lion. They had the claws, they had the bronze - like the coin, but… this was then the part that didn't make sense. They were guardians - protectors… they worked for the side of good. Why would The Powers send Doyle a vision of some demons who worked on the same side? - And why would that vision, or those demons, physically attack the messenger?

His shoulder and his belly throbbed where the scratches were gouged into him - reminding him of the damage he had sustained. Cordelia had rubbed some kind of cream on him, and it had helped some - but the wounds were deep and vicious - and there wasn't much she could do to numb the pain.

He knew what she had said to him, but still - he couldn't help but feel that this was a punishment, that The Powers had meant for him to get injured because they thought he deserved it. That was the only reason he could think of as to why they would send him a vision of other warriors for their side. He hung his head as he contemplated his cuts, and the reasons behind them. Was he really so bad? Did he really deserve this? The universe seemed to think so… but he was already trying his best to put right his mistakes. He wasn't sure how much more punishment he could take...

* * *

Hidden up on the first floor landing, Fred looked down on the brooding half demon. He and his consort hadn't realised she was still there. They were so caught up in his vision that they had forgotten her presence… but she had seen the raw looking scratch marks that now disfigured the Irishman's body. She knew well enough about the visions he suffered. That was why the monsters had released him from the prison she had found him in and made him their King, back in Pylea. But until today she had always thought of the messages he received as being a gift. Now, it was all too clear to her that they were anything but.

She didn't like Doyle - and she didn't really trust the woman that loved him, though she was a human. Doyle was a monster - and not just any monster - he was the King of all the monsters who had hunted her, and enslaved her and tried to have her executed. Even if she could forgive him for being a demon, she couldn't forgive him for that. Angel was a monster too, of course - he had that beast in him - but back in Pylea, Angel had been just as hunted as she was. And he was ashamed of the creature he became. Doyle, on the other hand, had lived up in the castle, wearing his golden crown, allowing the bad things to happen.

And he was the king because he had the pure sight - chosen by The Powers to receive their messages. Only now it turned out that The Powers had chosen him because he was bad, not because he was good. He was being punished for something terrible he had done… and Fred wished that the others had not left her alone in the hotel with him. She saw the way he hung his head, feeling sorry for himself. Did he feel guilty? She wondered. Could the King feel guilty? Or was he just angry that someone as royal and important as he thought himself was having to suffer the side effects of his visions?

As she watched, he pushed his chair back and got to his feet, wandering across the lobby on the hunt for his chosen consort.

* * *

Cordelia had shut herself in Wesley's office, once she had seen to Doyle's wounds and he had gone to his computer to research. She had scanned the bookshelves and then selected some likely looking books, dragging them down and laying them out across the watcher's desk. She skimmed through the index of each book, looking for references to either The Powers That Be, seers, or visions - and once she had page numbers, she flipped through to look at the content.

She was searching for any mention of previous seers, other demons who had been cursed with the visions - as Doyle had - and was looking to see if there was anything about the images physically manifesting on the seer. But so far she had nothing. There was the occasional mention of humans who had had received the visions accidentally - however, with ordinary people, if they weren't burned at the stake - then it seemed that within a couple of years their brains would simply explode. But that was the only physical side effect she could find reference too - a tendency to blow a hole in the skull of any human seer. A half demon like Doyle should have no problems bearing the visions. Certainly there was nothing about psychic claw marks being gouged into the messengers' bodies.

She snapped the book closed, in frustration, just as she heard her boyfriend call out her name: 'Cordy? Where are you?' And then there was a sudden thump - which sounded very much like an Irishman hitting the floor. She ran out of the office and, sure enough, there he lay on the ground, in the middle of the lobby, spasming as the vision pain crashed into him.

'Oh my God, Doyle! Twice in one night! Are you OK?' She rushed over to his side and knelt beside him, only to draw back in horror, her hand clasped across her mouth. Even from her position, up on the landing, Fred could see what it was that was causing the consort so much distress.

As he lay on the floor, still twitching as he saw the images in his mind, a rash of hideous, pus filled boils erupted across his right cheek; stretching from his neck to his forehead, they marred and disfigured the entire right hand side of Doyle's face...

* * *

'An icky, gross, boil covered demon,' Cordelia told the others, 'that's what he said he saw.' The team were gathered back in the lobby of the hotel, the men having returned with the coin. Fred had come down to join them, now that Angel was here. The only person missing was Doyle, who sat out on a bench in the courtyard, studiously keeping his back to the others. 'There was a storefront downtown on fifth and something,' she continued, 'and there was a key,' she produced a sketch. 'This is what he described, I drew it for him… it's another "find the artefact" mission but…' she trailed off and stared out at where her boyfriend sat, all alone.

'But every time he gets a vision of a new mission - the demon he sees physically manifests itself on his body?' Wesley asked. Cordelia nodded.

'Why didn't you say anything?' Angel demanded, 'this can't be ignored, we need to talk about this.'

'And say what?' she asked, exasperated, 'what is there to say except yuk, gross and unclean?' The others looked at her in disapproval, and she sighed. 'If you had seen it, you'd think the exact same thing… I love him, you know I do. It doesn't make a difference to me. But he can't live like this - waiting for the next vision to cut him up or disfigure him even more - you know how touchy he is just about the scary, ugly, hedgehog thing. This can't go on. But talking won't solve anything.'

'So - earlier tonight he suffered scratches that tallied with the claws of the demons we fought in the herbalist shop?' said Wesley, 'and now he is marked with the boils of the latest demon that Angel has to fight?'

'Pretty much sums it up,' Cordy said. 'He was going to tell you about the scratches once you got back with the coin… but I guess circumstances overtook us…' She looked into Angel's eyes, then, concentrating only on him. 'He thinks this is a punishment,' she said, 'that this is the next step in his atonement from the powers - but it can't be, it just can't. I've looked in Wesley's big, old books and there's nothing about seers being afflicted this way. The Powers wouldn't do this to him on purpose! He's their messenger, he's on their team! Why would anybody do that to him on purpose?'

All the others just looked down at their feet, they had nothing to say - no information they could offer to help, or to make Cordy - or Doyle - feel better. Cordelia sighed again, 'I'd better go to him,' she said, 'I don't want him…' she didn't finish her sentence, there were just too many endings, so much she didn't want - she couldn't pick one. Instead, she eased open the glass doors and stepped outside.

Angel turned to look at the rest of his friends, 'We need to figure this out now! Anybody? Gunn?'

The street fighter looked surprised at being called upon, and scrunched up his face as he tried to think of something useful. 'I had this auntie who used to get this nasty, crusty stuff on the back of her neck every summer,' he offered, 'turns out - she was allergic to shellfish.'

Angel stared at him for a moment - and then - 'that was helpful.' Gunn shrugged apologetically. This was not his area of expertise.

'Why would The Powers choose to communicate with Doyle this way?' mused Wesley, 'I'm sure we can rule out his idea of further punishment. The visions are his punishment and his atonement wrapped up in one… to harm a seer, and one connected to a champion no less, seems deeply counterproductive. But they must have their reasons.'

'Maybe we could ask them?' said Fred, everyone turned to stare at her, and she gulped as she found herself under the scrutiny of so many people at once. But she tried her best to explain herself. 'Y-you said "communicate", which got me thinking, everything's made of energy, right? Light waves, radio waves, x-rays, even brain waves are all electrical energy. If the King of th-' she cut herself off, scrunched up her nose, and started again, 'If _Doyle_ is receiving visions from The Powers That Be then they're being communicated somehow. Maybe we could figure out the frequency and trace the calls?'

Wesley's face lit up, 'yes of course! Well done, Fred,' he began to formulate a plan. 'Fred, Gunn I need you to start researching that coin - I'll draw up a list of books. Angel, you go find the demon and get that key.'

Angel glanced outwards, to where the young couple sat out together on the bench, Cordelia's arms wrapped protectively around Doyle. 'I don't wanna go anywhere,' he said.

But Wesley was insistent. 'Doyle has had two visions in one night - I've never known that to happen before! And you can see what they're doing to him - or you could if he would let us near him. If The Powers are taking such extreme measures, then we have to assume that the coin and the key are of great significance.'

'And so is Doyle. I got the coin like he said, and they sent him an even worse vision. If I go and get this key, how am I helping him?'

'You have to trust me,' Wesley said to him, 'I have an idea.'

* * *

As Cordelia had slipped out into the night air, Doyle had stiffened up on the bench, aware that he was no longer alone. He knew who it would be though, without having to look. 'Yuk, gross and unclean, huh?' he said to her.

She closed her eyes, and bit her lip, regretfully. She hadn't realised he could hear her all the way out here. 'Doyle - '

'No - it's OK. It's true. Might as well get used to hearin' it. It's not like children aren't gonna scream when they see me… might as well start growin' my thick skin now.' He heard the men talking inside, and twisted his mouth in bitterness and disgust, 'like Gunn's crusty auntie.'

Cordelia took a few steps towards him, and he shuffled further down the bench, away from her - turning his head slightly so that the right side of his face remained completely hidden from view. She sat down beside him.

'So much for not showin' the guys, huh?' he said to her, 'you think maybe I can get one of those "Phantom of the Opera" masks?'

She smiled, and wrapped her arms around his waist, nuzzling into the left hand side of his neck. 'That look would be a little melodramatic for you, I think,' she told him. 'It's more Angel's style. But maybe we can get you a nice ski-mask.' She kissed his neck, and then his jawbone. 'We'll sort this, Doyle - you'll see. It's just a mistake.'

'And if it's not? If I'm stuck this way?'

She nuzzled into him again, 'then I guess we both have to get used to the sound of screaming children.' She chuckled a little bit, and squeezed him tighter, 'luckily, I was never with you for your flawless skin.'

He managed a smile, he knew this didn't change the way she would feel about him - his Cordelia was no longer that shallow. But he still didn't want to have to look this way - for his own sake, if not for hers. Sure, he had never been the best looking of men, but he had never been a circus freak before, either - at least not in human face. 'You still think I shouldn't have left these visions back in Pylea?' he asked her.

But she didn't answer. She only held him tighter. He closed his eyes, realising that, for the first time, she was beginning to relent on the idea of him giving up the visions. He knew than how bad this was, how bad he looked - and how scared Cordy was for him.

* * *

Angel pulled up outside the store and jumped out of the car, sword in hand. He kicked the door down and strode in. 'I want the key and I want it now!' he demanded.

The man behind the counter looked startled. 'Oh - w -which key might that be?' He switched on a light revealing hundreds of keys covering the wall. The store was a key cutters. Angel felt a little bit stupid, but he didn't have time for embarrassment - Doyle needed him. 'Did you lose the original?' the man was asking.

The vampire brought out Cordelia's sketch, 'it looks like this,' he showed it to the man.

'Ah - yes - of course - this should only take a moment.' He reached under the counter and pressed a button - like a panic button in a bank. A buzzer sounded and a demon dropped down through the ceiling, behind Angel. Angel turned to face him, raising his sword to block the demon's own weapon. The demon was hideous - covered in throbbing, pustulating, bright yellow boils. The vampire hadn't seen Doyle's face - the half demon hadn't faced any of them since he'd been disfigured; but if this demon was anything to go by, then his friend must be really suffering - and Angel couldn't blame him for trying to hide his face - for being too ashamed to let people see him.

Spurred on by his desire to save his friend, he made short work of the boil covered monster - and took the key from him, before returning to the hotel.

* * *

Fred and Gunn sat out in the lobby, reading through the books that Wesley had asked them to look at. After a while, the young woman looked up and spoke to the man - she felt almost comfortable around him now, felt comfortable talking to him. 'I guess you'd rather be out fighting that thing with Angel than stuck here with me?' she asked.

The street fighter looked up and smiled at her, 'well - yeah - 'cause why would I wanna sit here with a cute, young woman, enjoying her company - when I could be out fighting an ugly, boil covered demon monster and getting myself killed?'

'I really can't apologise enough.'

Gunn began to laugh.

* * *

Angel arrived back at the hotel to find Lorne standing in the lobby, along with Wesley, Fred and Gunn. Doyle and Cordy were still out in the courtyard, the woman's arms still tightly wrapped around the man. 'How is he?' Angel asked, 'how are they?'

'They haven't come inside at all - we still haven't spoken to Doyle - or seen…' Wesley didn't finish. It didn't need saying. They all knew what they hadn't seen.

'So what happens now?' the vampire wanted to know.

Wesley explained his plan - the Host would use his psychic abilities on Doyle to try and trace the signal coming from the Powers That Be. Perhaps, once they had the signal, they could make contact with the higher powers - ask what was going on. 'It's a risky strategy,' Wesley informed the group, 'I'm sure Angel remembers from his dealings with the Oracles that the higher powers can be finicky and unpredictable. They might be very angry that some lower beings, such as ourselves, dare to contact them or question their methods, but…'

'But we can't just hang around here, lettin' them do this to Irish,' Gunn finished for him. The watcher nodded.

'So what are we waiting for?' Angel glanced between the people standing in front of him, 'Lorne - go out there - help him.'

But Lorne just looked awkward. 'Easy there - crumb bun,' he said to the vampire. 'I can't do this without getting up close and personal with our little Irish stud muffin - and so far he has allowed precisely Cordelia, and she alone, to get within ten feet of him. And even she isn't allowed on his right side. He needs to be talked into this - and it has to be gentle.'

Angel nodded, and then headed for the glass doors.

...

He stepped outside. It was a beautiful evening, the air was balmy and there was a slight breeze that carried the scent of the Jasmine bushes wafting through the air, like a delicate perfume. It was the perfect night for two young lovers to sit out under the moonlight - as long as one of them wasn't getting psychically attacked by monsters that were on the other side of the city.

'Hey guys,' Angel said, keeping his voice low. He thought about following up with a 'how are you?' but then decided it was a stupid question. Cordelia turned to look at him, though she never let go of Doyle, and gave the vampire a sad smile. The half demon didn't turn around, however, he stayed staring resolutely in the other direction.

'Uh - Doyle?' Angel was hesitant, this would be a difficult subject to broach - the Irishman might try to resist. 'Wes has an idea for getting in touch with The Powers - finding out what's going on, why they're doing this - maybe get them to reverse it.'

'Yeah?' He still didn't turn around.

'Yeah… but … Lorne is gonna have to… gonna have to … well I'm not sure what he'll do - but he has to get close to you, to track the signals from the visions. It means… it means he'll see…'

Doyle hung his head. Cordelia stroked his back, soothingly. 'It's better this way, Doyle,' she whispered. 'He might be able to fix this… otherwise… you can't hide out here forever.'

The half demon nodded his agreement, and Angel felt relieved. But his eyes lingered on the spot where Cordelia's hand kept moving in calming circles on his friend's back, and the way her head was nuzzled down onto his shoulder. Even as he felt pleased that she had convinced Doyle to co-operate, he still felt an uncomfortable jolt in the pit of his stomach, as he witnessed the closeness and tenderness of the young couple. 'I'll - I'll just get him,' he said, and stumbled back inside.

* * *

Cordelia had relinquished her spot on the bench to Lorne, though she stood close by. Angel hovered in the doorway. The rest of the gang stayed inside, respecting Doyle's desire to not be seen whilst he was afflicted with the boils.

With great reluctance, the half demon turned his head, so that the Host could perform his mojo on him. He tried to keep his face as low as possible, but there was no real way of hiding the gruesome, pus filled lumps that marred his skin. Lorne inhaled, sharply, on seeing the damage, but didn't make a comment. His red eyes were soft and sad, though, as he reached out and placed a hand at either one of Doyle's temples. Doyle sighed to himself. He was an object of pity to a guy with green skin and horns - that was how monstrous he had become.

The Host pressed his fingers to the sides of Doyle's head, rubbing them in small circles. He closed his eyes, and Doyle did likewise. 'OK,' said Lorne, 'now I want you to relax - picture yourself somewhere wide and open, like a field or a mountain.'

Doyle scrunched his eyes up tighter, remembering day trips out to the Wicklow mountains when he was small. 'Uh - OK - got it - on a mountain.'

'Beautiful. You're on a mountain top. It's warm and sunny. The sky is blue - the clouds are white and fluffy. You're Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music.'

Doyle opened his eyes and just stared at the other demon. 'Don't resist the process,' Lorne told him, keeping his own eyes closed.

'Fine - let me just mentally adjust my wimple.'

'Don't sass. I love that movie.'

The half demon shrugged and closed his eyes once more, trying to picture himself back at home, on top of the mountains. 'Alright,' Lorne was still massaging his temples, 'let's go looking for the Powers That Be - see if we can reach out and touch someone.'

* * *

Lilah paced up and down her office, as her independent contractor signed the paperwork. Outside agents were always such a faff, they never filled out the correct forms and then she was left chasing up documentation for months afterwards. If she didn't have a ten ninety nine for this guy then he couldn't get paid. Not that she cared - but he would expect payment for his unique services. 'You remember what we spoke about?' she said to him, once he was done.

'All that fire? How could I forget?' He sat down on the table, cross legged. He took a deep breath and then began to levitate. Slowly, he reached up and removed his Fez to reveal his exposed brain. It was grey and glistening and, as he levitated, it pulsated away in time to a strange rhythm. Lilah smiled to herself.

* * *

Lorne was still touching his fingertips against Doyle's skull. He was searching for the signal but he didn't seem to be finding anything. The half demon was resigning himself to the idea that this would turn out to be a bust, and that the gang would be no closer to curing him than they were before. 

_BAM_ he was hit by a vision - and the force of it threw Lorne across the courtyard. Doyle, himself, was knocked from the bench and lay on the floor jolting and spasming, as his mind was invaded by a new set of images.

He saw an office, and a guy with an exposed brain; and then he flashed to a dark place and a person engulfed in flames. As he saw the fire, in his mind's eye, he screamed out in agony - feeling the flames against his own skin. The man in his vision was trapped in a cage of fire, and then there was a demon - massive and bronze, guarding him. And then the pain in his head, and the pain of the fire, was too much - and Doyle lost consciousness, passing out on the ground where he lay.

Cordelia was at his side in a moment, and the rest of the gang tumbled out into the courtyard when they saw their friends fly from the bench and fall to the floor. Shakily, Lorne got back to his feet and made his way back over to the group. And then he saw what they were all staring at. Doyle was passed out cold, lying prone on the ground. The unclean disfiguration of his skin was all too visible to his friends - but it was not that that was making them look sick with horror. They were staring past the boils, and instead concentrating on the half demon's arms - which were now red and black and raw. The first degree burns, caused by the flames in his vision, had removed all the skin from his arms.

* * *

The man with the exposed brain gently landed back on the table with a soft bump. He opened his eyes and put his Fez back on. He grinned up at the lawyer. 'Well?' she asked impatiently.

'I think he got the message.'


	7. That Vision Thing: Part Three

Angel closed the door, leaving Doyle lying, still unconscious, on the bed and Cordelia tending to his burns. He went back downstairs, finding Lorne slumped on the circular sofa, a whisky in hand, and Fred sat beside him. Wesley and Gunn stood a little further apart, their heads together as they conversed. They looked up as they heard the vampire's footfalls on the stairs. 'Angel, good - I think you should hear this,' Wesley said to him.

Angel jumped down the last few stairs and walked towards the group, his face expectant. 'What? Do we know something?' He looked over at the groaning Lorne, 'did you make contact?'

'The visions aren't from The Powers!' Fred told him, her face eager, as she delivered the news.

Lorne looked up from his whisky and glanced at her, 'sure, sweetheart, steal my thunder. Next time, _you_ can be the one that gets thrown across the garden.'

'So if it's not The Powers … who's sending them?' Angel asked. But the Host was all out of answers. It was someone local, he knew that much. The signal was earthbound, and close by - and pretty authentic. It was easy to see why someone not attuned to psychic vibrations would mistake Doyle's recent visions for the real thing.

'So you're saying someone has hacked into poor Irish's head? Hijacked his visions for their own purposes?' Gunn asked, 'man - who'd do something like that? Who's _Doyle_ ever pissed off so much?'

Lorne began to answer him, 'they're transmitting false data through the celestial pipeline. I know it's a list probably a mile long, but I'd be looking at known enemies - and ones with powerful resources at that.'

But he needn't have spoken. At Gunn's words, Angel and Wesley had glanced at each other, realisation dawning. 'I'm gonna go tell Cordelia,' the vampire said, and headed back up the stairs.

* * *

When Doyle came to, he found himself lying on top of the bed in his own room. A blanket had been pulled across to cover him, though his arms lay on the outside of it. He remembered the vision, the intense pain of the flames and then not much else. He didn't want to know how he had ended up back upstairs, in bed - though he had his suspicions. One of the guys - probably Angel - must have carried him there. He groaned.

'Are you awake?' Cordelia was still sitting beside him.

He nodded his head, and then squinted downwards to see what she was doing. She was laying cloths on his burned arms and, considering the severity of the damage, whatever she was doing seemed to be easing the pain pretty well. 'What are y' doin?' he asked her, watching her lay another cloth onto his arm, and immediately feeling the soothing sensation soak into his skin.

'I'm applying cool compresses, of course,' she said. Her tone was business like, but her eyes were shining - as if filled with unshed tears. 'I've soaked them in aloe vera - it should ease the pain, some.'

'It does.'

She smiled.

'We were out of ice packs?' he asked her, as she placed yet another cloth on his upper arm.

'Don't be silly!' she said, 'you don't put _ice_ on a bad burn - it could damage the tissue. Cool water only.'

'It's a good job you took that first aid course,' he told her. 'I didn't know that.'

'Yes, well, when the person you love most in all the world has a tendency to get himself horribly injured every other week, it inspires you to learn as much as you can about treating wounds.' Her voice was still brittle, and it reminded Doyle of the time Kate Lockley had shot him, and Cordy had patched him up - before they were dating, before she even knew he was a demon. Whenever Cordelia was scared, her voice always became more brisk - like she was fighting to keep the emotion at bay. 'You think you can sit up?' she asked, 'I want to give you some painkillers.'

He shuffled his way upwards, it was hard not being able to use his arms; and then Cordelia gave him some aspirin, having to put it directly in his mouth so he could keep his arms still. She then held a glass of water for him so he could drink. He swallowed the painkillers and then shuffled back down so he was lying on the bed again. He stared up at the ceiling. 'I'd ask how I got here… but I don't wanna know.'

'Angel carried you.'

'Yeah… I said I didn't wanna know.'

She smiled again, but she was having to blink back her tears.

There was a sound over at the door, and she turned. Angel was standing there. 'How is he?' he asked.

'He's awake.'

'Doyle? Are you…' the vampire decided against finishing the sentence. Why ask when the answer was so clearly 'no'?

'OK?' Doyle gave a painful, rueful chuckle. 'I'm hard pressed to think of a time I've actually been less OK, bud, but I guess you need to know about my vision?'

Angel shook his head. 'The visions are fake,' he told his two friends. 'They're not coming from The Powers.'

'I knew it!' Cordelia exclaimed, she turned back to Doyle. 'I knew they wouldn't do this to you… I knew this wasn't a punishment. You don't deserve this. No one deserves this.'

'Oh - I can think of someone who might,' Angel told her, she glanced back around, looking confused. 'These visions are earthbound - being sent by someone local. Someone with access to powerful resources - who is an enemy of the team in general...and who might have a grievance against Doyle in particular.'

Doyle closed his eyes. 'Lilah,' he breathed. But Cordelia didn't say anything, she just got off the bed and walked over to Doyle's closet. The half demon reopened his eyes when he felt her weight leave his bedside. 'What are you doin'?'

She had the closet open, now, and had taken out her boyfriend's favourite fighting axe. The tears were gone from her eyes, and had been replaced by a look of determined fury. She headed to the door. 'Cordelia!' Doyle called after her, but it was Angel she was looking at.

'Are you coming?' she asked him.

'Cordelia - what?'

'I'm going to kill her - are you coming?'

'Cordy - stop!' Doyle called after her.

She turned back to look at him. 'I warned her already,' she said. 'I told her what I would do if she messed with you again. She did it again - she's run out of chances. I'm going to kill her.'

'You can't kill her,' the Irishman protested, 'she's human!'

Cordelia snorted in derision. 'She doesn't count.' She looked back at Angel, 'does she?'

Angel shrugged.

But Doyle was having none of it. 'Cordy - the courts would disagree with you on that! She's human and so are you, you can't kill her.'

'You may not have noticed this Doyle, but you're not exactly in a fit state to stop me.'

'Well, I was kinda hopin' that it was my extreme patheticness that would stop y'! Look at me, Cordelia! I need you here.'

She shook her head, 'I've done everything I can for you, the guys are all here. They can get you anything you need. I have a lawyer to kill.'

'And what about next time, huh? Who's gonna look after me whilst you're servin' 25 to life for murder one? Come on, Cordy, please. Take pity on me in my weak and vulnerable state. I need you.'

The angry fire seemed to die from her eyes, and she looked hesitant, relaxing her grip on the axe a little. Doyle sensed he was winning, and pushed home his advantage. He gazed into her eyes, trying to make his own as pleading and vulnerable as possible. 'Please - stay with me? I don't wanna be alone right now. And I don't want the guys - I want you.'

She dropped her gaze, lowered her axe, and nodded. But before she returned to Doyle's side, she looked at Angel. 'You find her,' she said, her tone one of barely controlled outrage. 'You find her and tell her that she had better pray that she _never_ crosses my path again. And then get her to reverse all this. And if she won't - take her hand again. In fact - just keep chopping until Doyle is cured.'

Angel nodded, and left the room. Cordelia sat back down on the bed, and took her boyfriend's hand.

'Thanks for staying with me,' he said to her, forcing a smile. 'I know you wanted to get your violence on.'

She sighed, deeply, 'well - and don't repeat this 'cause I will deny ever saying it - but you were probably right. You're far too hopeless to survive me going to prison for a long time. You'd be dead within a week.'

He chuckled again, still in pain - but sounding a little happier than before. 'You're dead right about that, princess.'

* * *

Lilah was sitting in front of her computer, she narrowed her eyes to help better her focus. 'Come on concentrate - concentrate.' She clicked her mouse and the little golfer on the screen hit the ball - but she had made an error, and the ball flew over the hole and landed in the water with a computer animated splash. 'Dammit!' the lawyer cursed to herself.

'Gosh.' Lilah jumped as the voice came out of nowhere. She looked up - the vampire was stood in the doorway. 'Jeez - I hate traps, don't you?' he said. 'I was gonna knock but you seemed so focused, I hated to interrupt.'

'How - how did you get in here?'

Angel strolled into her office and sat down on the chair opposite her. He put his feet up on the desk and crossed his legs at the ankles. 'Oh, you mean why didn't the vampire alarms go off?' He nodded his head, as if considering her question. 'Your colleague, Gavin, helped me out. Colleague - mortal enemy - however you guys play it around here. So, can we get down to business? I think you might be looking for these.' He held up the coin and the key.

Lilah smiled when she saw them, 'you'd be thinking right.'

He tossed the artefacts down on to her desk and got back to his feet. 'Right - well, now you have them - we're done here. You've got what you wanted, it's over.'

He turned to leave, but the attorney called him back. 'Actually it's not over!' she said, sliding the coin and the key back towards him, 'and you'll be needing these for your mission.'

'I'm not going on any mission,' Angel told her, glowering.

'No I'm afraid you are,' Lilah smirked. 'Or at least - you are if you want your pet mongrel to stop suffering the side effects of his visions. I'm told the boil demon was particularly hideous,' her smirk grew even wider, 'how is Doyle doing anyway?'

Angel didn't answer her, but his silence made her laugh in delight. 'That bad, huh? Then you see, we need to talk. What did the boy wonder tell you about his latest vision?'

'By the time he came to - we knew the visions were fake. Honestly, I didn't even bother to ask.' Angel strove to keep his voice bored and unaffected, to show this evil woman that she wasn't getting to him - and that she wasn't getting to Doyle. But he still sat back down so he could listen to her.

Lilah tutted, 'but you saw the burns, right? I'm told they were most impressive, and let me tell you that's just a little taster of what's to come. So - to business,' her voice became brisk. 'There's a young man who's been unfairly imprisoned and you're gonna save him. Isn't that what you do? Save people? Anyway the only way to save your little sidekick is to save this man - so you're gonna do it, whatever. You're not gonna let him down like last time are you?' she asked, referencing the time that she had conspired to have Doyle thrown in jail - and Angel had been too hung up over Darla to notice.

'You still have a lot of ground to make up with your friends to make this past year right. And giving Cordelia her little snuggle bunny back in one piece might just be the start you're needing. Hey!' she sounded like she had suddenly realised something, 'where _is_ Cordelia?'

She looked around the office, as if expecting to see her hiding somewhere - and then grinned very broadly. 'After the show she put on over my new hand, I would have expected her to be here - _fighting for her man_ ,' her tone became very mocking. 'Isn't that what she promised - well, threatened me with - last time?' Angel continued to glower, and Lilah laughed again. 'What? Is she too busy performing her Florence Nightingale routine over her pathetic, sickly half breed that she doesn't have time to come and make good on her threats? I'm offended.'

Angel was suddenly on his feet, and around the other side of the desk. He grabbed Lilah round the throat and pinned her against the wall, bringing his face very close to hers in order to achieve just the right amount of menace. 'Actually that pathetic, sickly half breed is currently the only thing standing between you - and your neck getting very friendly with the blade of Cordelia's axe. So I'd lay off the insults for a little while, if I were you, in fact I'd be thinking about sending him a big bunch of flowers to say 'thanks'.'

'He's lying on his sick bed, burned and disfigured, and he's still not man enough to have me killed?' Lilah rasped out. 'What's wrong with him?'

'He didn't stop Cordelia from killing you for your sake, Lilah - don't flatter yourself. He did it for her - to stop her getting into trouble. But you know what? It strikes me that I'm _not_ human. The laws don't apply to me. I can kill you with impunity - do my whole team a favour.' He squeezed her throat harder, 'you think Doyle would appreciate your head on a pole as a gift? Would he be man enough then, huh? If he used your dismembered body parts as interior decorations?'

'You kill me now - and the visions will never stop,' the lawyer choked out, she was beginning to turn purple at the lack of oxygen. 'Doyle will get cut, and disfigured, and mutilated until eventually he just ups and dies. I might be too dead to see it, but I assure you that sad, sorry ending for the worthless mick would give me a great deal of pleasure - wherever I am.'

Angel dropped his hand from around her throat, pushing her against the wall in his frustration. He turned his back on her, as she took deep lungfuls of air and began to massage her neck. 'So where is this jail?' he asked her, his voice sullen.

Lilah began to smile again, 'I knew I could count on you, Angel,' she told him.

* * *

Doyle came to, again. He wasn't sure if he'd fallen asleep or passed out, once more. Either way, he certainly hadn't meant to drift off - not when he didn't trust Cordelia not to sneak out and kill herself a lawyer if she thought he wouldn't miss her. But she was still beside him when he awoke. He squinted at the clock, trying to work out if he'd been out long enough for her to creep away, commit a brutal murder, and arrive back before he woke up. At least the police didn't appear to be on her tail, yet. 'Hey,' he said to her. She was holding his hand in her own, and he squeezed it as he spoke.

She smiled down at him, 'hey, yourself.'

'How long was I asleep?'

'Just a few minutes… Angel isn't back yet.'

'Yeah? Were you here the whole time?'

'I never left your side,' she told him, 'why?'

'Just checkin'.'

She squeezed his hand, then, and smiled again. 'Don't play innocent with me,' she said. 'I know what that question meant, buster. No - I haven't killed anyone whilst you were sleeping.'

'Glad to hear it,' he breathed a little laugh, and smiled himself, looking up at her. 'Thank you,' he said.

'For what?'

He shrugged - or tried to - it was hard to shrug lying down. 'For stayin' with me, for lookin' after me - for not runnin' away screamin' when y' saw my face full o' boils.'

'Oh - that.' She leaned forward, disentangling her hand from his and using it to caress the right side of his face. 'This doesn't hurt when I touch you?' she asked. He shook his head. 'Good.' she bent down and kissed him, then, brushing his lips with her own. 'This will absolutely, one hundred percent, get fixed in no time - I promise,' she said to him, once she had broken the kiss, 'but it still doesn't make any difference to me, and it never will.'

'I know. I'm still not thrilled with the idea o' everyone else seein' me though.'

She went back to holding his hand, and twisted her mouth into a wry smile. 'They've already seen,' she told him, 'when you passed out with the burns, and they all came rushing out to see what was wrong - the great honking pustules on your face we're pretty hard to ignore.'

'Oh - well that makes me feel a whole lot better.'

She chuckled. 'It should - you don't have to hide away. Everyone is horrified at what's happening _to_ you, but we're not horrified _by_ you _._ '

'Just my honking pustules?'

'No - just the damage that.. _Lilah_ .. is wreaking on you. _Again_.'

'Yeah - and to think it was just earlier this evenin' that I was hopin' we were done with Mrs. Evil Incorporated for good.'

'Famous last words,' Cordy told him, 'you should really learn not to jinx yourself like that.'

'I'll bear that in mind.'

There was a light tapping on the door, and Cordelia twisted her torso so she was facing it, 'come in,' she called. The door opened, and Gunn stood there, looking a little nervous. Doyle tried to turn his head, so that the worst of the boils were hidden from view. 'Hey, Gunn,' he said.

'Hey, man - how are you?'

'Peachy with a side of keen - you?'

'Uh - yeah - dumb question, huh? Listen - me and Fred were thinking of going out to get some tacos. Can we get anything for you guys whilst we're out?'

Cordelia wrinkled her nose. 'Isn't it a little late for tacos?' she asked, 'we already had dinner.'

'You know Fred,' Gunn smiled, thinking of the tiny little woman who always seemed to have room to eat more - especially if it was Mexican. He guessed that's what starving in a cave for five years did for you. 'Anyway - we didn't know we were gonna be pulling an all nighter when we ordered the takeout - we would have got more.'

The young woman looked down at her boyfriend, 'are you hungry?' she asked him, 'or do you want a soda?' But the half demon shook his head, he didn't want anything right now - or at least, what he did want couldn't be bought from some street vendor or Seven Eleven. He wanted his face back, and his arms healed - and he wouldn't mind having the gouges from the Chinese demons fixed up as well. But he was stuck waiting on Angel to deliver all of that.

'OK,' Gunn nodded, 'I'll check back in with you when we get back, OK?'

'Thanks,' Cordelia said, as the street fighter closed the door behind him. Then she turned back to the prone Irishman that lay before her and fixed him with a penetrating stare. 'I know people keep asking you this - and you get all avoidy - but not with me, OK? How are you doing? Really? Are you in pain? Are you…'

'I'm fine, Cordelia,' he interrupted. She raised her eyebrows in scepticism, but he insisted it were true. 'No really - I am. I was … when I thought these visions were comin' from The Powers - that I was being punished or … it was bad when I though that. I didn't know what was happenin' or why - or what would happen next - or if it would ever stop. And a part o' me - well a lot o' me, actually - thought I deserved this.' He sighed. 'But now we know it's just Lilah and … Angel can put a stop to this - when haven't we stopped her before? And I know that this _isn't_ punishment. I _don't_ deserve this. And I can't tell y' what a weight off that is.'

'Really?' She didn't sound one hundred percent convinced.

'Really. Truly. I'm not … I'm not - scared - anymore.'

Cordelia leaned in to kiss him again, 'you're so brave,' she said to him. 'Did anyone ever tell you that?'

He chuckled, sounding disbelieving, 'yeah - a real hero.'

'You are,' she insisted. 'I'm so proud of you.' She kissed him again, and only stopped when she was interrupted by another tap on the door. This time it was Angel - he had returned to give them the news of everything he had learned from Lilah.

* * *

The vampire returned back to the lobby, where he found Wesley sitting at his desk - pouring over his books. The watcher looked up when he heard his friend enter. 'How's Doyle?' he asked.

'He's alright - Cordy's making sure he's not in too much pain - and he seems… better - now we have a better idea of what's going on. Where are Fred and Gunn?'

'They went out for tacos.'

'At this hour?'

Wesley just shrugged, and turned another page in his book.

'What about Lorne?' Angel asked, 'did he go back home - was he OK?'

'He'll survive,' Wesley told him, 'you're not going to like this next bit, though.'

'Oh - what?'

The watcher sighed, and leaned forward on his desk, his elbows resting on the pages of his book. 'Everything I can find out about the coin and the key tells me that they are considered objects for good.'

'So the Chinese couple and the boil guy?'

'Were aligned with the powers of good, also,' Wesley confirmed.

Angel sighed, and folded his arms. 'Damn - it can be so hard to tell. Maybe we should all start wearing lapel pins or something?'

'Yes - well - the inscriptions on the two artefacts match. They work together, in fact, to transport you from this dimension into another - a demon dimension.'

'Any idea of what this dimension will be like?' Angel asked him, 'apart from demony and fortressy? I hope it's not like Pylea...'

Wesley frowned to himself, 'considering the burn scars on Doyle's arms, from his latest vision, I'd imagine fire is not out of the question.'

'Fire?'

'And if the young man is imprisoned, I'd imagine there may be guards.'

'And guards?' Jeez - why had Lilah gone to all that trouble with Darla to try and screw with him last year when she could have just sent him into this demon world of burning flames and brutal soldiers? It was beginning to sound like it may very well be a one way trip.

He turned to leave Wes's office and headed over towards his weapons cabinet. Wesley got to his feet and hurried after him. 'I needn't tell you that if Wolfram and Hart are sending you on this mission then it can't be good?' he said to the vampire. Angel just gave him a look, and then began to search through his weapons. Wesley wasn't finished. 'Just because Lilah tells you this man is wrongly imprisoned doesn't make it so.'

'You're right.'

'Nor do I have to explain to you that helping them violates everything you stand for.'

'Right again.' He grabbed an axe and a sword, and shoved a crossbow into his belt.

'Good. Then I don't need to convince you to let me go with you.'

'Right.' Angel blinked, as his brain caught up with his ears. 'What? No! Wesley - I need you here in case anything goes wrong.' He held up the coin, 'now, show me how this thing works.'

Wesley took the coin from him, and inserted the key into the hole in the middle of the bronze disc. 'Ready?' he asked. Angel nodded. 'This should take you there and bring you back,' Wesley told him, turning the key as if it were in a lock. It clicked into place, and the watcher tossed the whole thing onto the floor, where it began to spin like a top, creating a swirling vortex of smoke and light. 'You're sure I can't come with you?' Wesley asked Angel, staring into the portal the artefacts had created.

But Angel shook his head. 'Take care of Doyle,' he instructed, 'and try to stop Cordelia from murdering Lilah.' He took a step closer to the spinning coin. The vortex grew bigger, encompassing him. As Wesley watched, Angel became blurry, translucent and indistinct. And then he, the vortex and the coin all vanished from the lobby in a flash of light. The weapons the vampire had collected fell to the floor of the foyer with a resounding clatter.


	8. That Vision Thing: Part Four

'So, do you think Angel will find this Lilah woman and stop her?' Fred asked Gunn, as they walked down the street - headed for the nearest taco stand.

The street fighter shrugged, 'he knows where to find her - I guess the problem is what does she want? She's messed with Irish in the past, just for the hell of it, but this seems like a whole new level of nasty - messing up his face like that? And the burns?' He shuddered.

'The Chinese demons cut him up real bad, too,' Fred said. Gunn glanced at her. 'I saw the marks when Cordelia rubbed some ointment on them - they didn't know I was there - they're so wrapped up in each other, I guess.'

'Well - I think tonight they got good reason to be wrapped up in each other, don't you?'

It was Fred's turn to shrug. She looked around her, as she walked, her actions still nervous and squirrelly - like she might bolt at any moment. 'You OK?' Gunn asked her, noticing her apparent anxiety.

'I'm just not used to all this,' she said, 'the noise, the lights, the people. It's kinda overwhelming - like a flood. You think that's what the visions are like?' She changed the subject rapidly, as her mind jumped to something new, but without drawing breath. 'A flood of sudden knowledge overwhelming your senses? Does he see things and smell them? Or is it more just like knowing. Like the pit of your stomach knowing. Like in fifth grade, when I first saw Grayson Wells and I just knew we were going to go steady and even though we never did, looking back on it it feels like we did. Is it like that?'

'Damn girl!' Gunn laughed, 'was there a question in there somewhere?'

'Oh, yeah,' she grinned her nervous smile and laughed at herself, a little. 'What do you think the visions are like?'

'Normally? Well I know they're painful - and freaky, some of the stuff he sees really shakes him up - and yeah he gets sights and sounds and smells - feelings too. But if you want the full scoop, I'm not really the best person to ask, am I? You wanna know more, just ask Doyle.'

'Oh - uh - I-I wouldn't wanna bother him with my… I mean he probably wouldn't wanna…' she trailed off, and clasped her arms around herself as if she trying to keep herself warm - despite the balmy night air.

'Hey - Fred, you gotta remember - you're not bothering us - any of us. We want you feeling at home, being happy here,' Gunn told her, he smiled at her as he spoke. 'You wanna know about the visions? Ask Doyle - he'll be happy to talk to you - we all wanna talk to you, help you settle in… just don't ask him tonight. Pick your moment, you know what i'm sayin'?

'Oh,' she breathed a laugh, small and and self deprecating, 'I-I wouldn't want to… I couldn't.. I'll just… not.' She looked around the street again, breaking eye contact with Gunn.

The street fighter knit his brows together in confusion, wondering at her reluctance to talk to Doyle - when she seemed so happy to chat away with himself. But he decided not to push her. 'OK, whatever - move at your own pace - little steps. We don't wanna rush you.'

'Right - little steps - baby steps, one step at a time, one foot in front of another - down a long and winding path... that's what Angel said to me, too.'

'Well, sometimes tall, dark and coat swirling has been known to get it right. Not often. But sometimes.'

They arrived at the taco stand. Gunn bought himself a burrito and Fred selected a whole load of tacos, with different fillings, which the vendor bagged up for her. The street fighter paid and then, slurping their sodas, they headed back to the hotel.

* * *

Wesley made some tea and took it upstairs to the bedroom bound couple. Cordelia took her mug from him gratefully, and he placed Doyle's on the side - so that Cordy could help him with it when she was ready. 'I made yours Irish, Doyle,' the watcher told him. The half demon smiled his thanks, even as he strove to keep the right side of his face turned away from his friend. Wesley looked away, trying not to make him feel uncomfortable.

Cordelia wrinkled her nose up in disgust, ' _ew!_ What does whisky in _tea_ taste like?'

'It's not as good as whisky in coffee,' Doyle told her.

'But it's more soothing,' Wesley finished.

'So - has Angel gone yet?' the young woman asked, taking a sip of her tea and looking up at the British man.

Wesley nodded his head, 'I wanted to go with him, but he told me to stay in case…'

'In case he doesn't come back?' Doyle asked, 'and we need to come up with a plan B to stop me looking liking I belong in a leper colony?'

'Oh - hey - sweetie - your nose hasn't fallen off! It's not that bad!' She squeezed his hand and smiled at him.

But Wesley was nodding his head. 'Your latest - wounds - suggest that fire is going to play a big part in wherever he's gone to.'

'And our boy isn't great with fire.'

'Quite - and then there will be the guards…'

'So you're sayin' I should just get used to lookin' this way? That Angel won't make it?'

'I have a really great concealer,' Cordelia told him, her voice soothing, 'you can just use that.'

'Thanks, princess.'

But Wesley cleared his throat. 'Whatever is down there - Lilah, at least, seems to believe that Angel is more than a match for it. She wants this young man released from his prison. She wouldn't be sending Angel unless she thought there was a good chance he would bring this man back. This isn't actually a kill the vampire mission for her, it's a rescue the prisoner mission. Angel is merely the tool by which she means to accomplish that.'

'And if Lilah Morgan didn't have a track record of hurting me just for the sheer hell of it - I might actually believe that,' Doyle said to him.

Wesley twisted his mouth up. 'Well - it was worth a shot. Wherever Angel is right now is deeply, deeply dangerous. I shudder to think of the horrors he may be about to face...'

* * *

The vampire in question materialised in a dark chamber. The walls around him were of rough hewn stone and had skulls and bones worked into them - as if people had been suffering and dying here for many an aeon. His hands were empty and, checking his belt, he realised that his crossbow was gone too - all his weapons were left back in his own dimension. Well that was just terrific, it wasn't like you wanted jumping into a hell dimension to be too easy or anything.

As he took a step forward, his foot kicked the key, still embedded inside the coin - and he realised, with relief, that he still had the means of escaping this place. He picked it up and pocketed it before making his way through the chamber. There was a doorway to another room just across from him, and he could see the flickering light the other side - the kind of illumination that only fire could provide. He walked towards the doorway, slowly, and went down the steps he found.

Inside the new room, he saw a burning cube - a cage made entirely of flames - and a man trapped inside, completely engulfed. This explained that state of Doyle's arms, and Angel winced as he imagined the searing of flesh that his friend must have endured. He stood staring at the burning cage, until a movement made him aware that there was something behind him.

'Hi.'

The vampire span around, and came face to face with a massive bronze demon. It was like his skin was actually a suit of armour - he had a bronze plated exo-skeleton with several sharp blades protruding from different places. His eyes glowed red. And he was big. Much bigger than Angel.

'Hi,' Angel said back - trying to keep his face impassive.

'You do know you're not supposed to be here, right?' the bronze demon sounded concerned, but not angry.

'Yeah,' Angel said. He glanced over at the man trapped inside the blazing cube. 'What about him?'

'Oh - he's meant to be here. Do you have any idea how monstrous a guy has to be before he gets sent to us? We're a very high end institution.'

'And it's your job to keep him here,' Angel surmised.

The demon nodded. 'Yeah,' he held out his hand to shake Angel's, 'my name's Skip.' Angel took the offered hand and they shook.

'Angel,' he introduced himself, 'do you - ah - live here, Skip?'

'I commute,' the demon told him, 'it's not too bad - about twenty minutes.'

This was surreal, even by Angel's standards. He tried to get the conversation back onto a subject where he felt himself on more even ground - and asked why the man in the cage wasn't screaming in agony. But it turned out he was - Skip had just muted his cries, as there was only so many "my God the pain"s you could take before it got very tedious.

'And how does he stay in the cage?' Angel asked.

'My will,' Skip replied shortly. Then he sniffed. 'You're a vampire right? How come you smell like you work for The Powers that Be?'

'Because I do.'

'And you're here to try to - what? Rescue this guy? Shouldn't you be helping to keep him here?'

Angel sighed. It was a show of melodrama - vampires had no need to sigh - but he wanted Skip to understand the depth of his struggle, and how conflicted he was. 'I know - I don't like this anymore than you do. It's a long story.'

'Does it involve a girl?' Skip asked him, sounding sympathetic.

'Boy - actually.'

The demon looked surprised, 'well - it's a new century... I really can't talk you out of this?'

'Fraid not. I wish you could. We'll just have to agree to...' Skip slugged him across the jaw and he staggered backwards, blinking with pain. 'Disagree,' he finished, gasping. He kicked out, but the bronze demon was ready for him, and he knocked the vampire to the ground. Angel vamped out, jumped back to his feet and punched the demon in the stomach - hurting his own hand as much as he hurt Skip.

Skip swung at him, but he was able to duck under his arm, and then kicked out again. This time he connected, and the demon was forced backwards. He stumbled back, towards the burning cage. The man trapped inside suddenly reached out and grabbed hold of his jailer's shoulders, pulling him into the flames. Skip cried out in agony, as his head was engulfed in the fire.

Angel stood and watched for a moment, as the bronze demon struggled to free himself from the burning man's grip, but then he morphed back into his human face and ran towards the fight. He grabbed hold of Skip and dragged him back out of the flames, the man's hands were retracted back into the cage, as the two demons staggered upright. 'You OK?' Angel asked his adversary. Skip nodded.

'Good - sorry about this,' and Angel hauled back and slugged the demon as hard as he could. Skip fell to the floor, knocked out cold and - as his consciousness slipped away - the flames and the burning cage melted into nothingness. The man, naked and soot stained, was left standing where once his prison had held him.

* * *

Lilah paced up and down in the isolated spot she had arranged for the exchange - an abandoned spillway. She had two limos ready, and it was between these cars that she trod the same path over and over, checking her watch every now and again. Eventually, two headlights appeared in the distance, and then a car pulled up a little way from her own limos. The lawyer smiled to herself, as she recognised Angel's convertible.

Angel and Wes sat in the front. Gunn, Fred and the man from the prison were all sat in the back. 'You know what to do if anything goes wrong?' Angel asked his associates, glancing into the back seat.

'Pop goes the weasel,' Gunn said to him. Fred nodded grimly, and gripped the mace she had brought a little tighter. The street fighter smiled across at her, over the head of the captive man.

The vampire got out of the car and slowly made his way towards Lilah. The attorney quickly summoned six bodyguards from out of the limos - not wanting to have to face Angel alone, not twice in one night. Once she felt protected by the guards, she smiled her shark's smile at the champion headed towards her. 'You know nobody else at the company thought you could do it, but me, you're a remarkable man Angel.'

But Angel was in no mood for insincere flattery. 'Let's just get on with this. Fix Doyle - and you can have your guy.'

She smirked, and made her way over to the left hand limousine. The bulletproof, tinted window slid down, revealing the guy in the fez sitting in the backseat. She leaned in and talked to him and then the window slid back up. Then she turned back to Angel, 'this should only take a moment.'

Angel glanced over his shoulder, back to his own car, and Wesley took out his cell phone and dialled.

...

The phone next to Doyle's bed began to ring. The half demon had just fallen back asleep - helped along by the generous slug of whisky Wesley had given him earlier - and Cordelia snatched up the phone so that its ringing might not wake him. 'Hello?' she answered, her voice a hushed whisper.

...

In the back of the limo, the man was levitating once more. His exposed, glistening brain was pulsating and throbbing as he worked to reverse his earlier actions. Standing outside, on the spillway, Angel was aware of a weird glow emanating from the back seat - and he knew that whatever had happened to Doyle this evening, the cause of it was in that car.

...

Cordy glanced down at the sleeping Irishman. Before her very eyes, the boils and burns began to melt away - his skin healing and knitting back together - leaving him clean and whole once more. She exhaled deeply, with relief. A smile - her first genuinely happy one in hours - began to spread across her face. 'It worked, Wesley,' she said into the phone. 'He's OK - he's better.' Then she hung up, and caressed his healed face.

...

Back at the spillway, Wesley hung up his cell and signalled their success to Angel. He got out of the car, and Gunn got out with him - the prisoner also got out of the car. Then, watched by the two humans on one side, and the vampire on the other, the man - his hands bound in front of him with a thick rope - walked across to Lilah and her limousines. He put his hands on top of one of the cars to allow a bodyguard to cut the rope for him, he smirked at Angel the whole time - a smile of evil and of triumph. Once freed from his bindings, he got into the car.

'It was a pleasure doing business with you,' Lilah said, turning away from the vampire, 'until next time …' She jumped as something metal whipped past her. She glanced back at Angel and then heard the sound of breaking glass - and turned back to the cars.

The vampire had thrown a rebar right through the window of the left hand limo, and the guy in the fez now sat, slumped in the back, the metal bar buried deep into his exposed brain. He was dead. Lilah took a few, disgusted, steps towards him, but then felt a hand close around her neck. For the second time that night, Angel had her gripped around her throat: 'This is the last time - you hear?' he hissed at her. 'You wanna get to me - you come to me - Doyle, all my family, are off limits. You try anything against him again - and I will kill you.'

'Cordelia said the same thing months ago - and yet here we are,' she choked out.

He squeezed harder. 'The taking of a human life is a big thing. And the first time is always the hardest. Cordelia didn't understand what she was promising to do. But I got a lot of practice, Lilah - you really wanna test this threat to see if it's empty?'

He let go of her, as Gunn drove the convertible towards them, and jumped in the passenger seat. Lilah massaged her throat and watched them drive off - the vampire and his ragtag bunch of friends: the dumb muscle driving; the brainy guy in the back with - whoever that skinny chick was. And back at the hotel his oldest friends, and most loyal disciples - the girl and that hated half breed. This wasn't over, she thought to herself. Let the vampire glower and menace and posture as much as he wanted. The Senior Partners were not done with him. This wasn't over - in fact, it had barely started.

* * *

The next morning, Doyle and Cordy were downstairs in the lobby, sitting at the counter. There was a toaster beside them. 'So, you're feeling better this morning?' Cordelia asked. He nodded, but he didn't say anything, and he looked more than a little glum. 'Well, gee, calm down there, mister, or we might just fall of this crazy whirlygig of fun! You're not worried about your next vision, so what gives?'

They both jumped as the toaster popped, and Cordy took the waffles out - placing one on each of their plates and then squirting syrup all over them. Doyle dug into his with a fork, and waited until he had chewed and swallowed his first mouthful to give her his answer. 'No - I'm not worried about my next vision. It's a big relief to know that my next vision will just be bone wrenchingly, mind numbingly painful - and not turn me into the elephant man or anythin'.'

'So what's the problem?' She took a sip of her coffee and peered over the rim of her cup at him, watching him intently. He sighed, and dug his fork back into his waffle. But then he sighed again, and decided to answer her before taking his next bite. 'It's just - it's .. I'm fed up, I guess.'

'Of the visions?'

'No - well, yeah - but no, not that.'

'Then…?'

'I'm fed up… I'm fed up of always bein' the one that's weak. I'm always the one in trouble, that needs rescuin'. I'm always the one that Lilah goes after. I'm meant to be Angel's sidekick. I get fed up o' bein' the damsel in distress.'

Cordelia actually laughed out loud. Doyle looked offended, and she bit her lip and tried to look reassuring. 'OK - let's break that down, little Irish man. A) It is _not_ your fault that crazy, evil lady has taken a particular dislike to you. That just is what it is. She likes to see you suffer - and until I kill her, until you let me kill her - you're just gonna have to put up with that.'

'Yeah? And what's B)?'

' _B)_ You are not always the one that needs rescuing. Where did you get that crazy idea from? We all get in trouble, we all help each other out - we're a team and no one is keeping score.'

'But if they were - they'd notice I'm losin'.'

'Not true.'

'It is true - there was last night, and the time I got sucked into Pylea and you all had to come and save me, and last year with goin' to jail, and the time I got kidnapped and sold to a gladiator ring, and the time I got kidnapped and had my eyeballs sold, and the time I got kidnapped and nearly had my brains eaten…'

'OK OK I get it, you're a professional hostage!'

'Not to mention all the visions that are really disturbin' - all the times I can't help the team 'cause I'm too freaked out by what I've seen.'

'Hey,' she reached out and took his hand, squeezing it, 'those visions _are_ the mission. You help us just by having them - we wouldn't be anywhere without you. And who was it who rescued me from the dungeon in Pylea, huh? And destroyed the device that would make my head go all Kerpluey? And who kept me safe when I was impregnated by Skilosh demons and got rid of my third eye? And who switched off the life support machine of that mutilated lady so that I didn't have to do it? And who saved Angel from Spike and his torture demon? I told you - we all get hurt, we all get kidnapped - Wes got shot! We help each other, we take care of each other, and we don't keep a running tab. And you and me,' she leaned over and kissed him, 'we take especial care of each other, because we belong together.' She kissed him again.

'Yeah?' he asked when the kiss was broken.

'Yeah,' she agreed, smiling. 'Are you feeling better?'

He nodded and they went back to their waffles.

Just as they were finishing, Angel came down the stairs. 'Hey,' he greeted them, 'good to see you in one piece,' he said to Doyle, 'how are you feeling?'

'Like I could quite happily go another month - or another lifetime - without a vision.'

'That guy that did this to you is dead,' Angel assured his friend. 'I drove a rebar through his brain, he can't do that to you again - your next vision - it'll be better.'

' _Great.'_

Cordelia gave her boyfriend a reproving look, and then turned to the vampire. 'It was so brave and selfless of you to go to that demon dimension, it was amazing - really.'

Angel felt a funny feeling in the pit of his stomach at her praise. And he tried to brush it off. 'It was nothing - I'd have done the same for any of you, and I know you'd have done the same for me.'

'See?' Cordelia said, turning back to Doyle and arching her eyebrow at him, 'we're a team.'

'Yeah… but that guy?' The Irishman twisted his mouth into a worried grimace. 'To be in that place? As a human? He must have done something really terrible. And now he's free. And it's my fault. Maybe it would have been better if you'd just left me to suffer. Wolfram and Hart won this time - Lilah won this time. Who knows what this guy will do, who he'll hurt? At least those visions we're just hurtin' me - and maybe I deserved that.'

Cordelia frowned at him, 'I thought we agreed that nobody, least of all you, deserved what happened last night. You weren't gonna talk that way anymore.'

'Yeah - but now people are in danger - just so that I could be safe. It's a lot to live with.'

'You don't live with it,' Angel told him. 'Last night wasn't about winning or losing. It was about what was at stake. You were more important than any other consideration. I let that guy out and when the time comes I will deal with him. He's my responsibility. I'll deal with the consequences when they happen - that's all there is to it. You're safe - that's all that matters.'

The vampire smiled as he spoke, and kept smiling until the half demon broke eye contact and went back to eating the last of his waffles. Then the reassuring look slid from his face, leaving him pensive and worried looking. He briefly made eye contact with Cordelia, and she too looked afraid of what was to come.

* * *

High up in the Yoro mountains of Honduras, a man sat in a cave casting bones onto the mat in front of him, and reading the fate they prescribed. Outside, a thunderstorm raged - lightning lit up the sky with its jagged forks. The bones portended something terrible was on its way.

A woman appeared in the mouth of the cave, melting out of the darkness. She took down her hood and shook the rain from herself. 'You're a difficult man to find,' Darla said. 'Senor, do you know why I'm here?' He looked at her rounded belly and nodded. 'You are my last hope,' she said to him, 'I've been told you are very wise and very powerful. I tried everything and I can't get rid of it. So I ask you: what is this thing growing inside of me? And how is it possible?'

The man got to his feet. 'The father, he is also a …'

'Vampire?' she asked, 'yes - though not a very good one.'

'I will need some blood.' He picked up a knife and a cup. Darla held her hand out, but the shaman hesitated. She tutted with impatience and took the knife from him, cutting open her palm and allowing her blood to dribble into the cup. ' _Men_ ,' she muttered, 'such babies.'

The shaman took the cup from her and began to mix powders and herbs in with her blood. 'This has never failed me,' he told her, pouring the contents of the cup onto his hands. Then he rubbed his hands onto her belly - leaving bright red hand prints on her white shirt. He held his hands there for a moment, and then some invisible force blasted him away from the woman. He fell backwards, to the floor of the cave, and stared up at her in horror. 'I cannot help you. No man can. This is not meant to be known.'

'Yeah, yeah. Like I haven't heard _that_ before.' Darla looked down, and began to caress her pregnancy bump. 'I guess there's only one thing left to do. Time to go visit _daddy_.'


	9. That Old Gang of Mine: Part One

'That night still haunts me,' the vampire said, his face sincere and regretful. 'I'm ashamed of how I treated you.' He looked down. 'The way I used you.' He looked back up. 'I took - what I needed,' he cast his eyes low once more, 'then I cast you aside and that - that was wrong of me. It was very wrong.' He looked back up.

'He's reading!' Merl sounded disgusted. He was sitting at a table in Caritas opposite the apologising Angel. The bar was empty except for the group of demon hunters, the snitch, and Lorne.

Angel glanced over at his friends, who were standing by the bar. 'I made some notes!' he said, waving the cards he had made in their direction, as if trying to prove that his apology was still heartfelt.

'I don't feel the sincerity here,' Merl told them all. Doyle and Cordelia sighed, and exchanged a frustrated glance. Angel was huffing - he knew this would be a waste of time.

'Real friends don't need notes!' Merl snapped at him.

The vampire opened his eyes wide in exasperation - 'we're not friends, Merl!' he retorted, his tone irritated and aggrieved. 'We barely know each other!'

'Not like you made the effort either, is it?' The skinny little demon snitch got to his feet, kicked his chair back and stormed off towards the exit. Cordelia hopped down from her bar stool and scurried after him, blocking his way.

But Angel just shrugged, 'you know what? No - let him go if he wants to!'

But Cordy was trying to sweet talk Merl - trying to get him to listen to Angel again. Wesley and Doyle converged on the vampire, trying to get him to see sense, too. Merl was a good source, and they needed him in their work - they couldn't let the enmity and bad blood between the lizard like demon and the vampire get in the way of their professional relationship. 'You promised you'd make an attempt,' the watcher reminded his most difficult employee.

'Come on, man, he always comes through for us… the least y' can do is attempt to show him some respect,' Doyle said. Angel began to protest, and the three men's discussion descended into a hushed bickering filled with hissing and recriminations.

'Did you get a load of that tripe he was reading?' Merl demanded of Cordelia, who was still trying to prevent the little demon from leaving.

She had - but that wasn't the main problem as she saw it. 'I don't think it's fair to blame it on the writing,' she replied. His delivery had been all off - she should have coached him better.

'What does he _want_ from me?' Angel's irate question cut through the conversation between Merl and Cordy, and the snitch spun around to face him. 'What do I want, huh? I'll tell you what I want. I want back the three months I spent in therapy after being hung upside down in a sewer. That's what _I_ want!'

'Angel, read the cards,' Cordelia said to him.

Doyle took the cards from the vampire's hand and shuffled through them until he found something likely looking. 'Here - this is a good one, say this one, bud.' He proffered the card back to the vampire.

But Angel didn't take it. 'No - no you know what - he's right. You all are. Every time I went to Merl for information he came through, so I tell you what Merl…' he spread his arms wide, 'take a shot, go on - take a shot, Merl.'

Wesley, Cordelia and Doyle all burst out with remonstrations - trying to talk Angel round, trying to soothe Merl. Lorne was shaking his head. Gunn was trying not to laugh. 'OK - knock it off guys,' Cordy said.

'Take your best shot, Merl,' Angel repeated, ignoring her.

'Angel, please…' Wesley began.

'Come on, Merl.'

'You see this?' Merl turned to the others for support, 'he's goading me.'

'Take a shot Merl, come on this one's free.'

'No. No. Shameless. With the goading. You see?'

'Come on Merlalalal. Merlalalal,' taunted Angel - his arms still spread wide.

'Angel, man, stop it. This is low, bud.' But Doyle's warning was not in time. Merl snapped and picked up a bottle, he hauled back and swung it at the jeering vampire. But rather than make contact with Angel, the bottle hit up against a force field - an invisible wall - and recoiled back on the snitch. He was thrown backwards and stumbled into Lorne's open arms, who had been waiting to catch him. Doyle looked at Angel, reproachfully, and shook his head.

Merl was furious. 'Woah man you did that on purpose! You tricked me!' Angel sat back down, fighting to keep his face straight as the small demon continued to yell at him. Lorne attempted to reassure the snitch that it must all have been a misunderstanding, that Angel had simply forgotten about the sanctuary spell that bound Caritas, but Merl didn't believe him. He had had enough and he stormed off towards the exit. 'I'm done listening to this bloodsucker!' he cried, 'and that goes for the rest of you, as well. I never want to see any of you ever again!' Then he stopped mid flounce and turned around. 'Uh - so who's gonna give me a lift home?'

* * *

'So what are we gonna do?' Cordelia asked, as she unlocked her front door. Doyle followed her inside and the lights switched on, as if by themselves. There was the sound of the kettle boiling away on the stove - Dennis was clearly happy to see them and was making them some tea.

'I'll talk to him tomorrow,' the Irishman promised, referring to Angel. 'Get him to go round to Merl's and apologise - properly - this time.'

'Good - because like or not, we need Merl.' Two cups floated out of the kitchen, and settled themselves down on the coffee table. Cordy sat down on the sofa and took her shoes off, looking up at Doyle as she spoke. 'This is a business and broody boy needs to remember that and help us run it like one. Our work will be a lot harder if we can't rely on Merl to snitch for us - and Lord knows we need all the breaks we can get. Business isn't exactly booming right now.'

'I told y', I'll talk to him.' He sat down beside her and picked up his own cup of tea. He leaned his back against the cushions and closed his eyes. 'Angel needs to realise that he burned a lot of bridges this year, when he was off being the darkest avenger ever… there's wounds he caused that still haven't healed properly-' Cordelia glanced at him, creasing her forehead into a frown, as she wondered at his words, but she didn't say anything. 'He's got a lot to make up for,' Doyle continued, 'Merl is a part of that and he needs to realise that - super hero or not - it's him that's in the wrong here.'

'Yeah… although to be fair he was never exactly pleasant to Merl even before he went off the rails on his vengeance kick.'

'Maybe something about Merl just rubs Angel up the wrong way,' Doyle shrugged.

Cordy put her cup down and leaned over to kiss him. 'Mmm - maybe… but I've had enough of talking about them.' She kissed him again and then pulled back, quirking an eyebrow at her boyfriend. 'Maybe we could find something better to do, huh?'

'Any ideas?' he smiled at her.

'One or two,' and she grabbed him by the hand and pulled him into the bedroom.

Dennis tidied up their hot drinks, putting the empty cups in the sink to wash, and then switched out the lights.

* * *

Gunn's pickup pulled up outside Merl's lair. The little demon had barely had chance to get out of the truck properly, before the street fighter hit the gas and drove off again. The snitch went into his home, pulling the cord to switch on his overhead light. The bare bulb illuminated the room and Merl froze, his mouth open in a round o of shock. Then he began to back away, raising his hands protectively.

'No - no, please, no!' He cringed away as the sharp blades swung towards him. He just had time to register the sharp whistling sound of a sword cutting through air… and then there was a spatter of green and yellow gore against the wall, and for Merl - everything went black...

* * *

_Gunn smiled down at his sister in relief, she was alive. 'Hey big brother,' she smiled… and then he noticed her neck. There were no bite marks - when he had seen the vampires feast on her in the back of that van. He felt his stomach lurch, like he had missed a step in the darkness, and then he saw her face. Her eyes were yellow, her brow was wrinkled… her fangs were sharp. She pulled back her lips and bared them at him._

' _I was never gonna let anything happen to you. I was gonna protect you. You were my sister.' That heartbreak. So fresh. So complete._

' _I still am,' she moved in towards his neck. 'Say goodbye to everything you ever knew.'_

' _Goodbye.'_

_And she crumbled to dust._

'Alonna!' Gunn sat bolt upright in bed, panting. The sweat glistened against his brow and bare chest. He rubbed his face - it was a dream - just a dream… now. On the table beside him, his pager began to beep.

* * *

Angel and Doyle stood in the middle of the room, examining the yellow goop that coated the light bulb. 'Yeah - this was a nasty kill, alright,' the Irishman said, shaking his head. He stared around at the various fluids that were spattered up the walls, 'nasty way to go… poor guy.'

Gunn entered the room, and Angel turned to look at him. For some reason the vampire was holding a large box of donuts. 'You made it', he said to the street fighter. Gunn nodded, he had rung the hotel first and been told by Cordelia that the guys were all down at Merl's place - so now here he was, too.

'What's that?' he asked pointing to the sickly yellow fluid on the light bulb, which was the cause of so much interest to the two demon members of the team.

'That,' Angel pointed, 'is Merl.'

'Poor bastard,' Doyle said, 'someone did a real good job on him… he didn't deserve this.'

'Where's the rest of him?' Gunn asked. Angel pointed to the walls, and the young man winced. 'Nasty. What happened?'

'We don't know,' the vampire explained his side of the story - how he had come down to Merl's lair this morning, at the behest of Doyle, in order to have another attempt at a sincere and heartfelt apology. He had even brought donuts, he noted, indignantly. That explained the box of pastries, Gunn thought. But rather than sweet snacks and a reconciliation, Angel had walked into a world of slaughter - their stool pigeon was no more. 'So far we've ruled out suicide,' he concluded. Doyle gave him a reproachful look- this was not a joking matter.

Wesley came into the room, then, carrying a whole load of papers. He had found a cache of mail, personal papers and Merl's address book - all of which would need going over back at the hotel. 'I was rather hoping you might scan the addresses, Doyle,' the watcher said to the half demon, 'have a look if any of the names stand out to you as somebody who might be dangerous - someone you recognise from your - ah - less upstanding days.'

'Sure thing,' Doyle agreed, starting to root through Merl's clothes, to see if there was anything there that might shed light on the situation.

'And maybe you could hit the streets, when you have time?' Wesley continued, 'see if any of your old contacts have a beat on what might have brought this about.'

'Will do.'

'Hey guys,' Gunn was staring around at his friends ferreting through the snitch's personal belongings, 'what are we doing?' The others all paused in their search and straightened up to look at the street fighter.

Wesley creased his brow in confusion, 'we're examining the crime scene,' he explained - although such a thing should be obvious.

'No - I get that,' Gunn replied, 'but why?'

The others looked even more confused. 'Someone killed Merl,' Angel said slowly, spelling it out.

'Yeah - I know. Look I didn't have a beef with Merl, alright? But he was what he was.'

Angel and Doyle exchanged a glance. Doyle felt himself tense up at the other man's words. 'What's that supposed to mean?' Angel asked. Doyle folded his arms across his chest and stared pointedly at his younger friend.

Gunn seemed to at least realise that maybe he had spoken out of turn, that his words might have caused offence for some of the team… but nevertheless he stuck with his point. 'Nothing… it means what it means, alright? And I'm strictly talking about Merl here, no one else. But-' he waved his arm around to encompass the room, 'someone killed a demon. Hello! We do that all the time.'

'Merl was harmless,' Wesley said, going back to his searching.

Gunn threw his hands up to show he was backing off, 'OK!'

'Do you have a problem with what we're doin'?' Doyle asked him. He still hadn't unfolded his arms and his tone was injured, bordering on aggressive.

'No problem,' Gunn said, 'but..'

'But nothin'.' Doyle interrupted him. 'If Merl got into trouble then it might be us that caused it - we were always making him snitch on minions of hell. Why d'y' think he hung out in Caritas so much? It wasn't his love of Karaoke classics and free bar snacks. He needed the sanctuary… I know what that's like... to be in trouble with things bigger and meaner than you are.' He looked around the room, 'once upon a time - this coulda been me.' He fixed Gunn back in his stare, then, and narrowed his eyes, his voice taking on a much harder edge. 'And I'd hate to think that some punk ass kid would come into my home after my brutal murder and make comments about how it didn't matter 'cause I was _just_ a demon.'

'Hey - I said I was talking about Merl, not anyone else,' Gunn protested.

'Yeah, yeah,' Doyle growled and resumed his search through Merl's possessions.

Angel watched the two of them for a moment, noting that even now Doyle had backed off, Gunn was still glowering - as if something was still eating him. 'Are you sure you're not just bent out of shape because we interrupted you from something you'd rather be doing?' he asked. 'It doesn't normally take you two hours to answer a page.'

Gunn turned on the vampire now, 'excuse me? Did someone put you back in charge? Because if they did they forgot to tell me about it.' He squared up to the other man. Doyle stopped searching, once more, to watch what would happen - though he didn't intervene. If Gunn wanted to take on Angel then, as far as Doyle was concerned, after what the street fighter had just implied about him, he would enjoy watching Angel beat the other man's face into an exciting new shape.

It was Wesley that stepped in between them and attempted to defuse the situation. 'All right,' he said, keeping his voice calm and even, 'Gunn -' he turned to him, 'if this is something that you feel you can't get behind, We'll understand.' Over in the corner, Doyle snorted derisively, but Wesley ignored him. 'For now, why don't you just go on home?' he suggested.

The street fighter looked around the room, taking in the hostile stares of the half demon and the vampire. 'Yeah,' he agreed, still eyeballing Angel, 'I think that'd be a real good idea.' He stalked out of the lair.

'Little creep,' Angel said.

'Angel!' Wesley protested. But the vampire shook his head. It was Merl he had been referencing. He flicked through the Rolodex on the side. 'More names for you to look up here, Doyle,' he told him. 'You know - Merl was right. I never did bother to get to know him whilst he was alive.' He stared around the gore spattered room, 'I guess now I'll have to.'

* * *

Gunn drove his pickup Downtown and pulled up outside his old building. He got out and went inside. The room was lit by candles, and graffiti covered the walls. Gunn had come a long way in a short time - and it wasn't until he returned back here that he realised just how different his life had become. He remembered all too well the last time he had stopped by the old neighbourhood - the night George had died. George, Alonna… he knew he shouldn't have left his old crew alone for so long, but as the deaths piled up it became harder and harder to return - and easier and easier to stay up town with his new family. This place was just too painful, held too many memories…

He heard a noise behind him, and then felt something sharp dig into his neck, 'you wanna tell me what you're doing here, boy?' an unfamiliar voice asked him.

He turned around and came face to face with a loaded crossbow pointing directly at him. 'Nice rig,' he said to the man who held the weapon.

'I'm glad you like it.'

'He should - he built it.' Rondell came up behind the stranger, 'Gio - you wanna get that thing outta my boy's face?' The other man glanced back round at Rondell and then hefted the crossbow onto his shoulder, so that the bolt pointed at the ceiling.

'Glad to see you're passing on what I taught you,' Gunn said to his old friend.

Rondell grinned, 'word's out - vampires know not to cross Venice boulevard these days. Crews as tight as it's ever been - even back in your day, G.' The two men hugged.

Gio's eyes went round with recognition, 'Charles Gunn?' he asked, pointing at that very man. Gunn nodded that was indeed who he was. It turned out Gio had heard all about Gunn, that his name was part of the reason he had headed out to L.A.

'Gio's from Miami,' Rondell explained.

'Coast to coast, huh?' said Gunn.

'A little something like that,' replied the stranger, 'hey, Gunn, man - what do you think it is about places like Miami and L.A that bring out the teeth, you suppose? I mean you would think vamps would wanna hang out in less sunny climes, know what I'm sayin'?'

Gunn laughed and nodded his head. But then Gio's eyes narrowed and his voice became less friendly. 'Maybe we could ask your _boss_ why that is?'

'Yo Gio', Rondell wanted to smooth things over - keep everything friendly.

But Gio didn't listen. 'If you can't beat 'em join 'em , right, Chuck?'

Gunn squared up to the other man, 'it aint even like that.'

'Nuh? OK - if you say so. But the way I heard it, you were this one time big alpha vamp killer - and now you workin' for one. What's up with that?'

'Hey, Gio - who's meant to be on point out back?' Rondell asked - still trying to calm the situation down.

Gio never took his eyes off the tall street fighter in front of him, even as he answered his crew mate. 'That'd be me.'

'So why aren't you out there?'

Gio leaned forwards towards Gunn and sniffed, before laughing. 'Alright - it's cool. You have your nice little visit.' He turned to leave, but he spoke to Rondell before he did. 'You might wanna have it outside in the sunshine, just to be on the safe side you know.' He left the room, casting one final, hostile look back at Gunn.

* * *

The men had returned to the hotel. Doyle was sitting on the red sofa, outside the office, scanning through Merl's address book and Rolodex looking for any names that jumped out at him as trouble. There were a lot of names there - plenty that the small half demon would rather avoid if he possibly could - even now that he no longer owed money to any of them… but unless Merl had gotten into something way over his head, there was nothing in here to suggest how his insides had ended up splashed all over the walls and ceiling.

Wesley was in his office. He had Merl's other papers and was combing through those - as well as cataloguing the evidence they had collected.

Angel, however, wasn't working. He was leaning on the counter and peering through the glass doors at Fred, who was stood out in the courtyard, all by herself. 'I think you should go out there and talk to her,' he said to Cordelia.

The office manager looked up from the overdue bills she had been studying, and frowned. 'I'm not sure that's such a good idea - besides,' she gestured around the lobby, 'you're literally the only person here who isn't busy - you talk to her - she likes you.'

The vampire looked shy, 'but I haven't been able to make much progress with her. She's been back in this world for three months - and she's barely set foot outside the front door.'

'Right - 'cause it's not like last time she went out into the wide world she got sucked through an interdimensional portal and ended up living like a hunted animal in a hostile demon alterna-world or anything, is it? Oh no wait - it kinda is… she just needs time - and space.'

'I don't know,' Angel shook his head, 'I think this might be the kinda thing where she needs encouragement - a tough love kinda deal - but not too tough… and you're the best one of us for that.'

'You men are all big softies,' Cordelia agreed.

'So you'll speak to her?' He turned to look at Cordelia, 'woman to woman? I think she might feel better talking to you.'

'Oh - I'm not so sure about that,' she said, putting down the bills - she'd leave them another couple of weeks, they weren't on their final notice yet. By the time they were, the agency might have had a paying client.

'You don't like her?' Angel asked.

Cordy got to her feet and joined him at the counter, peering round him so she could also see Fred. 'Sure I like her - she's sweet, and adorable and … seems to be laughing at something that shrub just said - what's not to like?' She looked back at Angel. 'But, and I don't wanna come off as paranoid or anything - I don't think she likes me. Or Doyle, for that matter. Actually - she really doesn't like Doyle.'

'I can't believe that.'

'I know right? We're awesome - but…' she shrugged, 'it's just the vibe I get from her. I don't understand her.'

'You don't have to understand her, you just need to talk to her. Please... Try,' he made his eyes wide and puppyish, 'for me?'

Cordelia sighed, deeply, 'fine - we'll chat. But don't expect anything.'

'Thanks.'

The office manager returned to her desk and began to work at her computer, after a while she pressed print and the printer sprung into action. Angel took the paper out once it was done, and glanced down at it. 'What's this?'

'Enemies of Merl list - will you take it through to Wesley?'

But Angel had spotted something that he was less than happy about. 'Why is _my name_ at the top?'

'Um - "A"?'

'Merl and I were not enemies!' his voice was loud and heated, and attracted the attention of both Doyle and Wesley, who came over to see what the fuss was. 'Cordelia put me at the top of Merl's enemies list!' Angel complained, shoving the list under Wesley's nose to show him. 'We _were not_ enemies!'

'OK - my mistake,' said Cordelia - although she did not sound in the least convinced.

'I'm the one who found the body, remember!'

'Oh right,' she snorted, 'like that's not suspicious, first time you make a social call, Merl winds up dead.'

'I only went because Doyle told me - he was dead when I got there!'

'Right - that's a good story - stick with it.'

'Oh yeah, sure - I went dark and killed Merl.'

The three living team members all looked at each other - and then Wesley spoke, 'maybe work backwards up the list?' he suggested, to try and mollify the offended vampire. 'We'll end with "a's". We should start tracking these names - Doyle, any other names of interest amongst Merl's things?'

'Couple o' shady customers… no one that would spread him around the room though. I mean… a lot o' the guys we made him snitch on are already dead, courtesy of the dark avenger, over here.'

'Right - well, we'll head out then.'

The watcher made for the door, and Angel began to follow him - but then he turned back to Cordelia. 'You know, ask yourself this: if I intended to kill Merl would I have - brought donuts?'

'He's got a point there, darlin',' Doyle said, as he grabbed his jacket, 'Mr. Cheap aint gonna spend money he doesn't have to.' Cordelia laughed out loud, and Angel looked aggrieved - that wasn't what he had meant!

* * *

'Is that what everyone says about me now?' Gunn asked Rondell, as they stood together outside in the sunshine. 'Traitor? Vamp lover? Is that it?' But his old friend told him to ignore Gio - he didn't know Gunn - he didn't know anything.

'No but you do - is that what you think? That I turned my back on you to join one of them?'

'Hell, I aint seen you in months bro - I don't know which way your back is facing.'

'That aint an answer,' Gunn pointed out.

Rondell sighed. This man meant a lot to him, had taught him everything he knew - had given him a purpose in life, made him more than he was destined to be. But then Gunn had left, and Rondell had had to hold everything together. It had been hard. He owed Gunn a debt of gratitude. But he'd also been abandoned by him. What could he say that encompassed all that?

'The truth?' he asked, 'I aint heard one word from you since we spread what was left of George in the river. Hell, some of us were beginning to wonder if you were still in this world…'

I didn't mean to disappear,' Gunn told him, 'I guess after George…'

'Nah, man, you were gone long before George. It was Alonna. Things were never the same after Alonna.'

Gunn closed his eyes for a moment. No. Nothing was the same after Alonna. Nothing would ever be that same ever again. His sister. His reason - for everything. After her… what could he do? His heart wasn't in it. He doubted his ability to keep his crew safe. If he couldn't protect his own sister, then what could he do for anyone else?

'A lot, man,' Rondell told him. 'There are people alive today because of what you started.'

'What _we_ started,' Gunn corrected him.

'You got that right,' Rondell grinned.

* * *

Cordelia and Doyle arrived at the latest apartment. The four team members had split the list in half and then divided into pairs in order to speed up the process. The Irishman had known most of the demons and lowlifes they had to visit, and the young couple had made quick work of their suspects. So far - nothing suspicious.

It had been a nice day, as well; stinking sewer hideouts and flea ridden scum pits aside. Spending time out of the office, walking in the sunshine between one filthy lair to another, had been a nice change of pace for them. Usually it was interminable research followed by terrifying fights to the death. A bit of good old fashioned leg work and sleuthing was a welcome change of pace. It was just a shame it had come off the back of Merl's gruesome murder.

'So who's this guy?' Cordelia asked, as they reached the door. This place seemed less gross than a lot of the places they had visited.

'Name's Samuel Larch - he's a bookie. Demon. I know him...'

'Of course you do,'

'...but unlike _me_ , Merl owed him a lot of money. I, on the other hand, am a clean and upstanding citizen.'

'Thanks to me.'

He grinned at her, 'thanks to you, princess… otherwise there is no way I'd be standin' at this door. I would'na been able to help all afternoon - some of the guys we've been talkin' to?' He whistled, 'we go way back - and it's not pretty.'

'Gee - tell me more about your life of crime, Doyle, it really turns me on!'

He gave her a look, 'there's no need for sarcasm,' he said, and then knocked on the door. 'Hey Sammy?' He called out, 'you in there? It's Doyle - I wanna ask you about Merl, if that's OK?'

There was no reply. 'You think he's out?' Cordelia asked. Doyle knocked again - nothing - and then he tried the door. It was open, he pushed it inward and the pair of them entered the apartment, and then pulled up short.

The room had been smashed up, the furniture destroyed and it's broken pieces strewn around the room. Like with Merl's place, yellow slime was splashed against the walls - the last few remains of Samuel Larch. 'We need to ring all the guys,' Doyle said, 'whatever is doing this is big.'

'And pissed off,' Cordelia said, as she reached in her purse for her cellphone.

* * *

The demon lumbered down the sewers, its massive frame almost touching both walls, its head brushing against the ceiling. It made a gurgling, slurping sound as it moved. It was hit with a sudden beam of light, and turned to look - blinking, like a deer caught in the headlights. It lowered it's slush puppie. 'Hello?' It called out, it's voice quavering, 'who's there, please?'

A gang of armed men, carrying flashlights along with their weapons, came charging down the tunnel. The demon dropped his drink and began to flee in terror - but the men were quick and they chased him down, cornering the slow moving demon against a grate. The demon's eyes widened in terror, and he cried out, as the men began to hack away at him. Then one of them pulled out a crossbow.

'Smoke him, Gio,' one of the gang said. And Gio pulled the trigger.


	10. That Old Gang of Mine: Part Two

Gunn arrived at the apartment. He found Doyle out in the corridor, talking on his cell, 'yeah… just checkin' things out, bud… well if y' hear anythin'...' the half demon nodded a greeting at the street fighter and then continued his conversation. Gunn entered the apartment. Wesley and Cordelia were going through the debris - searching for clues.

The watcher pulled the head of a crossbow bolt from out of the wall and examined it closely. 'Gunn,' he said, when he noticed the other man standing there.

'Hey -' he greeted both his associates, 'where's Angel?'

'He's checking on something else,' Wesley informed him.

'He and Doyle have a hunch - something's going on and it's bigger than we thought,' Cordelia said, looking up from her place on the floor where she was combing through the detritus from the splintered coffee table.

'Yeah? So what we got?'

'His name was Samuel Larch,' Wesley said, 'Doyle and Cordy found him last night.'

'Doyle _knew_ him,' Cordelia added, 'this whole thing is just getting a little bit hairy for my liking.'

'The guy was a demon.' It was a statement, not a question. Gunn was looking at the yellow splashes of gore on the wall - realising that nothing human could have left those marks.

'A demon who lived in an apartment, like a regular person,' Cordelia pointed out. She sounded annoyed, and Gunn glanced over at her. 'Like _Doyle_ ,' she clarified.

Gunn sighed - so it wasn't just Irish who was getting his panties in a bunch about these demon murders, his girl was worried too. Seemed kinda strange - they killed demons every day of the week - what difference did it make if Merl the snitch or Samuel Larch got iced? He looked around the room, at the destruction, and at his two co-workers carefully trying to salvage evidence from it. 'What are we doing here?' he asked. 'Who are we supposed to be working for anyway? Did The Powers send us here? Did Doyle have a vision?'

'No mind numbing, bone wrenching headaches courtesy of the PTB today, bud, no,' Doyle said, arriving in the doorway. 'Kizzie said he's heard somethin's goin' down,' The Irishman told his boss, 'demons o' all stripes bein' cleaned out - no one knows by who though, word on the street is to lie low… not that it's helped so far.'

'And this matters why?' Gunn asked in exasperation.

' _Hello!_ People are dying!' Cordelia said to him, getting to her feet.

'No - _demons_ are dying - demons aint people.'

'Thanks, man, just say it as y' see it, don't bother to sugar coat it, huh? I guess us demon not-people don't have feelin's that need worryin' about.' Doyle looked very pissed off - again. And, beside him, Cordelia looked outraged.

'Aw - don't give me that, man,' Gunn said, 'you know I don't mean you - hell, I don't even mean Angel. You can't pretend that we don't kill demons every damn day. We aint worryin' about their feelin's then - so why is this different? That's all I wanna know.'

'Charles - whoever - or whatever did this - is breaking into demon's homes and murdering them in cold blood,' Wesley pointed out. 'The danger this poses to certain members of our own family aside, this is just - wrong. We've linked this killer to _eight_ victims so far.'

'Yeah? And how many demons have we all killed?' When did you pass eight, Doyle? Wes? Cordelia - were you even outta high school before your body count got into double figures?'

The three others all looked at each other, uncomfortably. It wasn't that Gunn wasn't making sense - he was, in a way, but he was missing the finer picture in all this. 'Look, man, Merl was harmless - and so was Sammy. I knew him. He was completely assimilated into the human world - no weird religious rites or rituals - no eatin' people, or wearin' their skin, or anythin'. Completely regular Joe. But a demon. And that's not his fault.'

Wesley placed the arrow head into a clear plastic bag and set it down with other bags like it by the sofa - all the clues they had collected so far. 'Doyle's right,' he said, 'some of these demons are harmless. Living amongst the regular people - part of society. No history of violence, no threat to anyone. Of the others - at least two of them would have been considered to be irredeemably evil.'

Gunn sat down on the sofa. 'So what are you all saying?'

'Whoever is committing these killings is not discriminating,' Wesley told him, 'it makes no distinction between good and evil, harmful and harmless - it just kills anything demonic.'

'Seems like the only things any o' these guys had in common is that they weren't human,' Doyle said, 'there's no other pattern.'

'And that's bad,' Cordelia said, sliding he arm through Doyle's and gripping him, protectively, 'it means that anyone with even a little bit of demon in them isn't safe until we find whoever is doing this and stop them.'

'You wanna stop this demon killing machine?' Gunn asked, raising his eyebrows at her, 'when, as I far as I can see, it's doing our job for us.'

'Do I want to stop the monster that might decide, on a whim, to murder my boyfriend? Hmmm let me think … uh _yeah!_ '

Gunn opened his mouth to reply, but before he could say anything, Angel appeared in the doorway. 'We were right,' he announced, 'it happened again.'

'When?' asked Wesley. Down on the sofa, Gunn noticed the bag with the arrow head in it, and picked it up to examine it.

'Last night,' the vampire told them all, 'a Yarbnie was eviscerated in a sewer tunnel in Century City.'

Doyle and Wesley both looked crestfallen at the news. 'Oh man,' Doyle said.

Cordelia and Gunn both looked nonplussed, however. 'A yarbie? What's that?' asked the street fighter. He stood up and, with a slight of hand, pocketed the bag containing the arrowhead without the others noticing. He picked up another bag and then put it down again, making it look like he was casually just looking through all of them.

'A Yarbnie,' Wesley corrected, 'a balancing entity, completely non -threatening.'

Gunn looked around the crowded apartment, 'you know - there's a lot of us here, why don't I hit the streets - see if I can shake anything loose?'

'I got people lookin',' Doyle told him, 'they'll ring if they find anythin'.'

'Yeah, but I know guys you don't,' the younger man pointed out, 'different side of the tracks - it's a big city - can't cover too much ground.'

'Yes, that might not be a bad idea,' Wesley agreed. And Gunn strolled out of the apartment - with his stolen arrowhead - leaving the others to continue their search for clues.

* * *

Gunn was back with Rondell, he showed his old friend the arrowhead. 'This was dug out of a wall in an apartment over on the Miracle Mile.'

Rondell shrugged, 'yeah, so?'

'So I recognise it,' the street fighter said, 'this is from my old rig - the one Gio's been using. Look, I came here to give you a heads up, alright? I think you got a rogue on your crew. Your boy Gio's been out there killing anything that moves. Now somebody, meaning you, has got to have a sit down with him, man. Let him know this aint the way we do things down here.'

But Rondell began to laugh - and checked which apartment Gunn was talking about - the Miracle Mile? Tall white towers? Gunn agreed with the description, and his friend grinned. Gio wasn't a rogue! Sure, it was him that had found the hideout, but they had all been there - Rondell included.

'You?' Gunn was incredulous.

'Bro - that thing living there - it wasn't even human.'

'But did it attack anybody?'

'No, man, we got away clean.'

Gunn shook his head, that wasn't what he had meant. He wanted to know if the demon had attacked someone before the crew had turned up and killed him.

'No - man, we didn't give it chance to. What's the matter?'

The tall street fighter sighed, his shoulders slumped a little as he took in the news. 'Nothing,' he said to his friend. But things were the matter. Things were wrong. And Gunn didn't know how to put them right again, but, nevertheless, he knew he had to.

One of the crew called Rondell over, and Gunn watched as they began to saddle up, ready for the next raid. He saw machine guns being passed around and became even more alarmed. 'You guys packing heat now?' he asked.

It was hard to keep the disgust out of his voice, this time. He had always held very strong opinions on firearms - and why guys like them shouldn't carry them. It fulfilled a stereotype - continued the cycle of violence and mistrust and criminality - making it harder for any of them to break out, to be better. Guns kept the community down, and Gunn had always believed in building up the community - keeping his people safe, whether that be from demons, gangbangers or racist cops.

But Rondell didn't hear the tone in his friend's voice, or he chose not to register it. 'Can't be too careful, man,' he said, giving his own weapon an appreciative glance. 'I got to go, hey - you wanna come with us tonight? Gio says he found a new nest or something, primo hunting.'

'No, man, I got something.' He might not yet know how to stop it - but Gunn wanted no part in this.

He turned to go, Rondell pointed at him, 'be good,' he said, grinning as he prepared for his night of hunting.

Gunn walked away, but found his path blocked by Gio. He eyeballed him, but the shorter man stood his ground. 'You know something?' Gio asked, he nodded towards Rondell. 'He still thinks you're some kind of hero.' He looked Gunn up and down, 'but we know better don't we?' Gunn said nothing in reply, and Gio smirked. 'Yeah, we know better.' And he walked away, leaving Gunn alone.

* * *

The evidence bags were spread out across the counter, and Wesley was combing through them all, checking what he had against the massive pile of books he had next to him. 'I have no idea what this thing might be,' he told the others. 'It doesn't fit any of the data I have available to me.' He glanced down at the bags, 'something's missing.'

Fred walked down the stairs, her nose buried in a book. She passed them all by, without looking up - and walked out into the courtyard. Angel looked at Cordy, and began to motion towards the other woman with his head. 'Maybe it's something that hasn't been recorded before,' he said to Wesley, as he still tried to silently persuade Cordy to speak with the other woman.

Doyle's phone began to ring, in his pocket, and he answered it, just as Wesley spoke to Angel.

'Hey Kizzie, you got somethin'?'

'No - I mean _something's missing_ \- from here - one of the evidence bags is gone,' he rooted through them, 'seven, eight, nine, yes - here's ten… here is twelve. Where's eleven?' He looked up, just as Doyle snapped his phone shut, 'what was eleven?' the watcher asked, frowning.

'Search me, bud, but listen - Kizzie thinks he might have found somethin' out - I'm gonna go over and see him.'

'You want me to come with?' Cordelia asked, but Angel shook his head at her and pointed at Fred. Cordelia sighed, 'fine!' She kissed her boyfriend, 'you be careful,' she warned. He nodded - and she walked off to the courtyard to try and bond with Fred.

'I'll ring as soon as I know anythin',' the half demon told the others, 'good luck findin' that missin' bag.' And he left the hotel to go and speak with his contact.

* * *

Fred was sat out in the sun, perched on the edge of the fountain in the middle of the courtyard. Her nose was still buried deeply in her book. Cordelia came out of the glass doors and approached her, quietly. 'Hi,' she said.

Fred looked up and screamed, jumping to her feet. 'Ah - oh - uh… you startled me.'

'I'm sorry,' Cordelia replied, trying to keep her voice soft.

'No no - it's my fault, I'm sorry.' She watched as the chosen first consort came further into the outside space, and tried to make her escape, 'well - I'll get out of your way.'

She began to head back for the doors, but Cordy reached out. 'No - Fred - I want you to stay, stay.' She sat down on the fountain and when Fred peeked back at her, patted the bench beside her in an inviting fashion. 'Ah - actually I was hoping we could - talk, y'know?'

Fred scuttled back, and sat down beside her. She had better do what the consort told her. The consort wielded all sorts of power - back in Pylea, and here in the hotel. Fred had noticed the way everyone hopped to do what Cordelia told them - even though Wesley was the boss, even though Angel was the champion, even though the King was the King. The consort still seemed to be running the show.

Cordelia took a deep breath. She cleared her throat, and then took another deep breath. The silence grew large between them. 'Did you mean now?' Fred asked her.

'Yes! Yes - I'm sorry - I just feel a little awkward… Angel wants you to get out.'

'Oh,' Fred jumped back to her feet at once, and began to babble, to hide her hurt and despair. 'Of course, I understand. I only have a few things to pack, it won't take long.'

Cordelia realised how her words had been misconstrued, and immediately tried to rectify her mistake. 'No Fred! That's not what I meant! Out into the real world, you know, just for an evening or something.'

Fred's face lit up, and she breathed a deep sigh of relief. But then, a moment later, her face fell again, as she considered the second half of the consort's sentence. She turned her face away, biting her lip. She wasn't ready for this. A trip to the taco stand, or a ride in the car, with Angel or Gunn - that was one thing. But a night out? Into the world?

'I don't mean alone - or anything,' Cordelia said to her. 'We could - we could go together.' Her voice went shy, as she spoke. She knew Fred wasn't comfortable around her - that her offer might be taken up less than gladly, or rejected out of hand.

'T -Together?' Fred stammered, 'you and me?'

'Sure.'

'Just the two of us… not…'

'The guys are all busy right now. Maybe one of them could give us a ride, though -' she peered through the doors, 'Wes looks available,' she concluded, 'what do you say?'

'Are you sure _he'll_ be OK with us going out - with Wesley?'

'Who? Angel? This is all his idea in the first place.'

But Fred shook her head, and kept her face turned away. 'I mean you're meant to be _his_ consort after all,' she said, but she was muttering - as if to herself, as if she had forgotten Cordelia could hear her. 'We don't wanna upset the King, you upset the King they swing the crebbil at y' - they swing the crebbil and then your head is gone and that's no crug-grain and kalla berry breakfast, let me tell you!'

Cordelia looked bemused. 'You mean Doyle? Pfft - I upset him all the time! Anyway, he doesn't care what we get up to on an evening - and if he did - what's it to him? This isn't Pylea, Fred. Doyle _is not_ a king, you are not a runaway slave, and it is safe out there. You can go outside without being afraid!'

Fred turned her head slightly, so she could look at Cordelia again, and began to nod slowly. 'OK - I suppose - it might be alright if I was with you, right?'

'Of course it would,' the other woman agreed, her voice encouraging.

'I mean … it's not like anyone's gonna be payin' attention to me, or notice me if I'm with you.'

'Uhuh.'

'I mean - I'm just a nobody and you're the chosen consort of a king. No one's gonna look at me next to you.'

'Exactly,' Cordelia beamed, and then engaged her brain, 'oh - no - wait! I mean, people will notice you.'

'They will?' Fred didn't look too pleased to hear this, but Cordy didn't notice.

'Yep - and you know why? Because you'll be standing on stage in a white hot spotlight.'

'I will?' Fred looked positively sick. But Cordelia nodded her head and grinned.

* * *

Doyle arrived at Kizzie's place. Like Samuel Larch, and Doyle himself, Kizzie was a demon that lived quietly amongst the humans - in an apartment on the second floor of a low rent building. The building needed a key to get into it, but there was a buzzer system for guests to gain entry. He pressed the bell for his contact's apartment and heard the click of the intercom. No voice came down to ask who was there, though. 'Hey Kizzie, it's Doyle, can I come up?' Again, there was no answering voice, but the half demon heard the buzzer go - and the front door unlocked itself, electronically. He went inside and climbed the stairs.

He padded down the hallway, and knocked on Kizzie's door. There was no answer, and he frowned - he was surprised that his acquaintance was not already waiting for him. Like he had at Larch's, he pushed the door and found it open. And inside, he found exactly the same as he had last time. Almost.

The place was riddled with bullet holes, the stuffing was poking out of the sofa, where it had been shot to pieces, the walls were pockmarked and pages from books were strewn all around the room - where they had floated down when their tomes were blasted in the crossfire.

Unlike with Merl and Larch, however, there was a body. Kizzie was slumped against the far wall underneath the living room window - his body also riddled with bullets. Doyle ran to him, and knelt down beside him, 'oh, man, Kizzie, what…?'

With a great, shuddering, gasping, breath, Kizzie opened his eyes - and struggled to focus on the Irishman. 'Not.. safe…' he wheezed.

'What? Kizzie, man - who did this to you?' Doyle began to fish in his pocket for his cell phone. He began to dial 911.

'Still… here…' breathed out the dying demon, and Doyle froze.

'What?' And then he heard one of the internal doors creak open, and he realised - it flashed across his mind, taking less than a second - that Kizzie couldn't have possibly pressed the buzzer to allow Doyle entrance to the building, not in this state. His assailant was still here - it was the assailant who had let Doyle in - hoping for another demon kill.

He turned to look, he was holding his breath without realising, and he could hear his own blood pounding away inside his ears - and feel the frantic hammering of his heart in his chest. He saw a group of young men - younger than himself - all of them packing machine guns, and looking at him like he was a rabbit in a snare. 'Aw man - it's human,' one of them complained, shouldering his gun when he realised. Doyle squinted at him - he seemed familiar for some reason…

But one of the others - the one at the front - kept his own weapon trained on Doyle. His face was lit up with an evil grin. 'It runs with demons,' the man said, 'I say we smoke it.'

Doyle glanced around the room, in desperation, and then back down the barrel of the machine gun. He made his split second decision - and before the young man had a chance to pull the trigger, the Irishman morphed into his demon face, and dove through the window just above Kizzie's head.

He heard the cries of the men, 'man it's a demon!' and a blast of machine gun fire, as he crashed through the glass. And then he tumbled down onto the street, thankful that Kizzie did not live too high up. He landed funny, though, his leg was splayed out at an odd angle - and the pain shot through his entire body, making him almost throw up in agony. His knee was dislocated, he realised.

Above him, he heard one of them stick their head out the window. 'It's injured - get it!' There was a blast of machine gun fire aimed down at the street and - his leg screaming in agony - Doyle pulled himself out of the way. But he knew that the others would be on their way down. He took a deep breath, grit his teeth - and then snapped his knee joint back into place. He howled out in pain, as he did, but then he was back up - and running.

He raced down the street, his injured leg protesting every foot fall, but he kept on going. He kept his demon face on as well - relying on his extra speed and strength to get him through. But, behind him, he could hear the running steps of the gang - and knew that, even if he could outrun them, he couldn't out run their bullets. He turned down one road, and then another, twisting and dodging his way through the streets in an attempt to lose them before they got close enough to fire.

He turned down an alleyway. It was blocked off at the end by a chain link fence and he turned to double back. But the gang closed in, and he had no choice but to run further down into the dead end. He heard them come to a halt, as they found him, and - without looking back - used his demon abilities to leap at the fence, scaling it in two bounds. He landed the other side and continued to run, without pause. There was a burst of machine gun fire, but it was one of frustration. The demon had got away. 'Come on, Gio, man - it's just one runty little demon - let's go hit up that nest you found.'

Hidden round the corner, behind a dumpster, Doyle drew in great, gasping breaths. Even as a demon, he was pretty out of shape; and, whilst the added strength and speed helped some, he still wasn't up to all the athletics he'd been forced to perform tonight. His injured leg was still tender, and painful. His heart still beat so fast in his chest that he worried it might just stop - or explode, and his whole body felt like jello. Hearing the men leave, he morphed back into his human form, and allowed himself to collapse on the floor until he recovered.

* * *

Gunn walked into the dimly lit lobby of the Hyperion - there didn't seem to be anybody around, until Angel came out of Wes' office, looking through some papers as he walked. He looked up and saw Gunn standing there: 'hey.'

'Hey - you the only one here?'

Angel told him he was, and the street fighter asked how the case was going, feigning a casual interest as he checked on his family's progress in tracking down his old crew. But the vampire wasn't sure how things were going. Wesley was still insisting that the killings were random, but Angel felt that there was something familiar in the pattern - he had an idea that there was more to this, he recognised it.

'How so?' Gunn asked him; his whole body tense, as he waited for the answer.

'This seeming randomness of it, the chaos?' he put the papers down, and wrinkled his brow, 'there is a greater purpose behind it.'

'What?'

'To have fun.'

Gunn didn't reply. That tracked, he thought - remembering Rondell's grins, and the heat they were all packing. Gio might be leading this, but his old crew were behind the new boy every step of the way. They were working all across town, when time was they only protected their own turf. And they were taking out anything - when back in Gunn's day they had been strictly a vampire killing operation. And then there were the guns - when once it had been anything they could lay their hands on. Gunn's own favoured weapon was still his axe made from a sharpened hubcap. The crew was now the step beyond that - several steps beyond.

Angel noticed his friend's quiet and asked him if anything was wrong. Gunn told him all was fine, and asked where Wesley was - on finding out, he turned to leave.

* * *

' _Crazy. I'm crazy for feeling so lonely. I'm crazy…'_

Cordelia leaned across to speak to Wesley, 'I swear to god, she chose the song herself!' Wesley smiled in appreciation, but kept his eyes focused forward. They were sat at a table in Caritas, watching Fred sit up on the stage and sing the Patsy Cline classic.

' _And then someday you'd leave for somebody new….'_

Gunn walked down the steps and through the metal detector. He saw the small woman sat up under the spotlight, her little voice wavering as she sang into the microphone, and stood still watching her for a moment. He smiled. Then he saw Cordelia and Wes at their table, and ducked his head down and walked in the opposite direction. He arrived at the bar, where he nearly bumped straight into Lorne. The anagogic demon gave him a look. 'Don't,' Gunn said to him. Lorne took a sip of his ever present seabreeze and continued to stare. 'I said don't - stop it - hey! Don't go reading me!'

' _Worry, why should I let myself worry?'_

'I wouldn't,' the Host replied, 'but sweetie, you're a billboard.' Gunn glanced across at Wesley, and Lorne followed his gaze, 'yeah, he came in here tonight with some questions. Looks like you got the answers.'

' _I'm crazy for thinking my love could hold you,'_

'I really don't feel like going over there,' Gunn told his psychic friend.

'Yeah, I know …' one of the perks of being psychic, 'so you wanna talk about it?'

' _I'm crazy for tryin', crazy for cryin'...'_

'Do I gotta sing?' Gunn wanted to know, he hoped that he didn't. He wasn't in the mood - and Wesley was in the audience. But the Host never answered. He was interrupted by a hail of gunshot fire. The crew had arrived at the club, and were opening fire on the clientele, who were powerless to protect themselves inside the demon sanctuary. One demon was shot to pieces, and his white blood splattered all over Fred, who fell off her stool, with a yell.

Gunn grabbed the Host, and pushed him behind the bar, where they both took cover. Over in the audience, Wes and Cordy flipped their table over and used it as a shelter, hiding behind it. Demons were being shot to pieces, as bullets sprayed the air. One man used his gun to shoot down all the bottles lined up behind the bar, and the booze and glass rained down on Gunn and Lorne, where they hid.

Then Gio strolled into the centre of the room, his sawn off shotgun resting against his shoulder. He grinned. 'Party time - woohoo!'


	11. That Old Gang of Mine: Part Three

When he was sure the demon hunting gang had gone, Doyle crawled out from behind the dumpster and began to limp his way back to the hotel. This was bad - and he needed to speak to Angel. Whilst he had crouched, hidden in that stinking alleyway, waiting for enough time to pass to be sure his hunters had truly left the scene, he had had time to place the one that had seemed familiar.

It had suddenly dawned on him, everything clicking into place, and he knew where he knew him from now. That young man had visited the hotel back in the spring - wanting to borrow Gunn's truck. He was one of Gunn's old friends. That group - all those men - they were Gunn's old crew.

His leg was still killing him, and the half demon winced in pain, as he hobbled through the streets. He rested up against a lamppost for a few minutes, and took some deep breaths. It would be easier - more bearable - if he went back into his demon face. His leg had hurt like hell, as a demon, but it hadn't been this bad. But, unfortunately, he was out in public now. Ordinary people kept passing him by, in the street, some of them were already giving him odd looks, as he clung to street light and gasped for breath. They probably assumed he was drunk. There was no way he could risk going demon face out here - his green skin and blue spikes - not to mention his glowing red eyes - were way too conspicuous to be worn out in the normal world.

He noticed a bench - across the road and just down the block from where he stood - and with a great effort, forced himself away from the light and staggered towards the seat. He slumped down on it - and closed his eyes, willing the pain away.

He wondered if Gunn knew what his friends were up to - if he knew it was them that had murdered all these demons in their own homes. And then he remembered how weird Gunn had been at Merl's - and at Sammy's - and, with a growing sense of dismay, Doyle began to wonder if, rather than just knowing about it, maybe Gunn had been in on some of the kills.

The possibility stung. Merl and Sammy and Kizzie were old acquaintances of Doyle's. He had known them a long time - he had a lot in common with them, or he used to at one point in his life. That Gunn would help murder these men - and not recognise their likeness to Doyle - seemed unbelievable. Which meant, if he had been there, Gunn knew exactly how like Doyle these other demons were, knew that Doyle belonged in the same category as them, and he had killed them anyway. Like he thought they were just monsters, like he thought Doyle was just a monster. Just another demon. Not on Gunn's team. And that hurt.

Sure, they came from opposite ends of the world and were a different species to each other, but that had never seemed to matter before. It had always seemed as unimportant a difference as one of them being tall and the other short. They were supposed to be friends. They had fought side by side for over a year now, they had stayed together when Angel lost the plot, Gunn had jumped into an alternate dimension - with no way of knowing if he could get back - just to rescue Doyle, when he got sent to Pylea. That should mean something - Doyle had always assumed it did. And when they had bumped into each other at the demon clinic - the street fighter had been very concerned when he thought that the Irishman might be sick. They _were_ friends. They always had been.

But now, Gunn's old crew were killing people like Doyle, and Gunn didn't seem to have a problem with that.

The street had emptied out, and Doyle took a chance and morphed back into his spikes. The pain became instantly more bearable - he didn't want to go back to his weaker form if he didn't have to. He made a decision - he would keep the spikes, and keep his head down as much as he could, and stick to the back roads. If he heard people approaching, he would morph back into his human face until they had passed - like driving down a dark lane, at night, and adjusting your beam when another car approached.

He got back to his feet, and stumbled his way down the block, his head hung low to hide his face. He just hoped that Angel would be able to find some answers, when he spoke to him.

* * *

The gunfire rang out through the club. Behind the bar, Lorne winced as if he were in pain. 'Oh my club!' he moaned.

As the hail of bullets came to an end, Wesley dashed out from behind the table and leapt up onto the stage. He swept the fallen Fred into his arms and then carried her back to behind the makeshift barricade. Cordelia put her arm around the other woman. 'What's going on?' she hissed, 'I thought demon violence was impossible in here!'

'Those aren't demons,' Wesley told her. He had got a good look at the men as he had hurried across the room - and he was none to happy. He recognised one of them all too well.

...

'Come on it's time - let's beat it!' Rondell said to the crew. They'd killed a few demons, made their presence felt, now they should move on - before the trouble started.

But Gio was in no hurry. There was something he wanted Rondell to see. 'Don't be in such a hurry,' he said, 'you're liable to miss out on some of the more - interesting - things in life.' Then he turned and scanned the room. 'Yo Charlie Gunn!' he yelled out, 'where you at? Come out come out wherever you are - I know you're in here!'

From his place behind the bar counter, Gunn got to his feet and faced down the man who had called him out. 'I'm right here.'

Rondell took a step back, his face twisted up with confusion. 'G-man - what you doing here?'

But Gio was smiling his evil smile. 'Come on,' he said, 'tell him. Tell him how you been rolling in here for _months_ \- tossing back drinks with your demon buddies.'

Rondell refused to believe it, but Gunn couldn't answer him. He didn't deny the charge. 'What do you expect?' spat Gio, 'his best friend's a vampire.'

'Rondell,' Gunn kept his voice calm and even - hoping to talk some sense into his old friend, 'just take the crew and leave.'

But Rondell was not willing to listen to sense. He wanted answers - and he and his boys weren't going anywhere until they got some. What was Charles Gunn doing at a demon bar, socialising with a bunch of monsters like they were people?

'That's right - we want some answers,' Gio said - stirring up the trouble, further. Fanning the flames.

'I think we all would.' Wesley stood up from behind his table, and stared around at the crew, before looking straight at Gunn.

'Wesley!' Cordelia hissed, keeping herself and Fred low. But the watcher didn't listen to her - this needed sorting, and Gunn had to sort it.

'Wes, stay out of this,' the street fighter said to his friend. But Wesley shook his head. 'As much as I would like to, I'm afraid I'm already in it. We all are.'

Behind the bar, Lorne stood up as well, so he was stood beside Gunn. Immediately, on seeing his green skin and horns, a couple of the crew grabbed him and hustled him out onto the floor. 'Hey, hey that's enough!' Gunn jumped over the bar to attempt to protect the Host.

Over in the corner, a grey skinned demon babbled to himself in fear. 'Oh god oh god oh god,' he whispered over and over.

Rondell was pointing his gun at Lorne, and glaring at his old friend - his idol - who stood beside the demon, trying to protect it. 'I don't believe this!'

* * *

He wasn't far from the hotel, now, Doyle thought. He heard footsteps coming down the road and quickly morphed into his human face. The instant pain in his leg nearly made him cry out, but he satisfied himself with a few deep breaths. The person gave him a funny look as they walked past. Once they were gone, he put his spikes on, once more, and limped onward. Just a few blocks more… he could make it…then he'd collapse on the sofa, and Cordy would bring him some aspirin and some scotch - and Angel and Wesley would make a plan. And he wouldn't have to do anything else until the morning. He had already done his part - he had solved the case. He didn't have to be involved in the cleanup. The sofa and the scotch were calling to him, he lumbered forwards … he could make it …

* * *

'It was them,' Wesley said, 'they killed Merl and the other demons…' he looked at Gunn, and the street fighter said nothing. 'You already knew,' he concluded.

'I should have said something,' Gunn admitted, 'I was going to, I was just … trying to work things out. Figure out how to deal.'

'Have you worked it out yet?' Lorne asked, from his position at the business end of a machine gun barrel.

'I'm sorry.'

'You're gonna apologise to this thing?' Rondell was disgusted. This thing wasn't human - it wasn't a person. It was a monster - and Charles Gunn - of all people - was gonna treat it like it mattered? He lifted his gun, and then looked at his old friend, who was still protecting the green skinned freak. 'Move.'

But Gunn wouldn't. 'You can't do that man. I can't let you. You lost the mission, bro.'

'What?'

Gio levelled his weapon at Gunn, a big grin on his face. But Gunn ignored him, and spoke only to Rondell. 'What you've been doing, man, this aint right. None of this is right. This is not what we're about.'

'The hell you say!' Rondell retorted, 'I don't know what you're about - but we're doing what we've always done. Protecting our own!'

'Is it protecting your own to break into other people's homes?' Wesley wanted to know.

Rondell swung his gun on the British man. 'They weren't people - are you?'

Cordelia got to her feet, and stood beside Wesley. Guns were trained on her as well, but she tried to face them down - to not show fear. 'Stop!' she said, 'stop it!' This was getting ridiculous. Gunn's old friends were losing it - order needed bringing into the situation.

But apparently she was the only one who thought that - because Wesley was still winding things up. 'If you don't mind I'd prefer a clean kill,' he said, staring at the machine gun in Rondell's hand. 'The last time I was merely wounded, it took months to heal. Wounded, if I recall, in an attempt to help you.'

Rondell stared back. Wesley had hit a nerve.

'Look at me,' Gunn said to him, 'look at me, this has got nothing to do with them. This is between us.' Rondell glanced over his shoulder at his old friend. 'Us' Gunn repeated, 'let them go.'

'We can do that,' Gio agreed, ' _we_ aint monsters.'

Gunn threw his car keys at his friends and told them to leave in his truck. Wesley didn't move, but Cordelia picked the keys up. Rondell was looking at Gunn now, his weapon trained back on him. 'How can you be sitting here with these things and tell me that I'm the one that lost the mission?' he demanded.

But Gunn was adamant that he was right. The crew had used to face danger because they had to, but now they were seeking it out. For fun. And not discriminating between killers and innocents. That wasn't right - it wasn't what they had been about.

A movement, out of the corner of his eye, caught Rondell's attention and he spun back round and pointed his gun at Cordelia once more. She had been helping Fred to her feet and leading the other woman away. 'One!' he demanded, 'just one! Her.' He nodded at Cordelia, who glanced at Wesley. 'The others stay.'

Gunn began to protest, and Cordelia wrapped an arm around Fred's tiny shoulders. 'I'm not leaving here without her,' she stated, 'no way.'

But Rondell didn't listen. He pulled Cordy off the other woman and bundled her to the door, even as she fought and protested. 'The rest will be able to leave after she's brought the vampire back.' He looked at Gunn, 'then we'll see who's lost the mission, bro.'

* * *

Angel walked down the staircase into the lobby, Cordelia was chasing after him. She had found him up in his suite of rooms and told him what had transpired at Caritas - and now he appeared to think that he was going to go over there and save the day. 'We have to think of a better plan,' she said to him, 'this is a bad plan. And I'll tell you why - it's _their_ plan! They want you to go there where you _can't_ fight so they can kill you!'

'I don't have a choice.'

But his office manager did not agree with that. 'It'll be suicide.'

'It'll be OK,' the vampire tried to assure her. But she knew that it wouldn't. Angel hadn't seen these guys - she had - and they meant business.

She was interrupted in her desperate bid to talk her friend out of attempting mission impossible, however, by the door opening and a very sore and weary looking Doyle limping inside. He had his demon face on, and he staggered his way across to the sofa and collapsed in a heap. 'Doyle!' his girlfriend forgot all about Angel as she hurried over to his side, 'what happened to you? Why are you in demon face?'

'I broke my leg,' the Irishman croaked, his eyes shut, his head leaning against the back of the sofa.

'You broke your …. How?'

'Jumpin' outta window.'

Cordelia pulled herself up short and just stared down at him. 'Is there any point in me asking what exactly led you to jump out of a window?' she asked him.

He opened one eye, and fixed it on Angel, 'we got trouble, man,' he rasped out.

'Boy, don't we know it!' his girlfriend replied, 'whilst you were out - trying to fly - Gunn's old crew turned up at Caritas with a bunch of machine guns and shot the whole place up! Now they want Angel to go over there. The others are being held hostage.'

Doyle pried his other eye open. 'What?' he looked up at Angel, 'y' can't be thinkin' of goin'. It's Gunn's crew that killed Merl and Sammy. They'd killed Kizzie when I got there and then they chased me for five blocks - and me with a broken leg! Y' can't go up against these guys - they mean business.' Then he looked at Cordelia. 'Cordelia, Princess - is there any chance you could get me somethin' for the pain? It's rather a lot o' pain.'

'Sure,' she bustled off to find some of the stronger pain killers she kept in her first aid kit, and whilst she was gone, Doyle turned back to his friend. 'So what are y' gonna do? Y' can't fight 'em - not in Caritas…. But if the others are there… oh man...' He closed his eyes again.

Angel began to scribble something down on a piece of paper, 'I got a plan to solve this,' he handed the paper to Cordelia just as she arrived back with the painkillers. After she had given them to Doyle, she looked down at the note in her hand, 'what is this?' It looked like an address.

'Transuding Furies,' Angel told her.

'Gesundheit.'

But the vampire explained to her that these furies were the women who performed the sanctuary spell for Lorne every month. If Cordelia went to them they would remove the spell, and Angel would be able to fight. All she had to do was mention his name - shouldn't be a problem. She, however, looked doubtful. 'You know them?' she frowned.

'I did.'

'And they'll remember you?'

'They should.'

Doyle forced his eyes back open, and grinned up at his friend - despite the pain he was still in. 'Yeah? What did you do to 'em, bud?'

'That isn't important,' Angel said, after a beat. 'What matters is - they'll remember me.'

Doyle raised his eyebrows, and grinned even more broadly. 'That's how it is, huh?' he looked impressed.

'Well they better remember you,' Cordelia pointed out. 'So they lift the spell - and then you fight? All twenty of them? And you still die? Not loving the plan, General Custer.'

'Doyle'll come with me.'

The Irishman groaned loudly, 'did I mention the pain I'm in?' he asked. 'I just wanna lie here and feel sorry for myself. I'm really not up to a fight to the death this evening.'

'Our friends are in trouble,' Angel said to him, quietly.

Doyle looked at him for a moment, and then nodded and heaved himself to his feet. 'You be quick with those furies, Princess,' he said to Cordelia.

She nodded. 'I will, you be careful.' She thought about kissing him, and then decided not to try on account of his spikes. She looked down at the address again, and then back up at Angel. 'I told her she'd be safe with me,' she said to the vampire.

He sighed. 'I know.'

* * *

' _Did you ever know that you're my hero?'_ Gio was up on stage, mangling "The Wind Beneath My Wings," shouting every word out and laughing, ' _You're everything I would like to be. I can fly higher than an eagle…'_

Gunn and Wesley stood over near the bar. 'We have to do something,' the British man said, quietly. 'If Angel walks in here, they'll kill him.'

But Gunn shook his head, 'no they won't,' he replied. 'They're gonna make me do it.'

Wesley stepped away from the street fighter and wrapped his arms around Fred, who was standing, still and frightened, by the table they had used for cover. She clung to him, and he felt her whole body tremble.

' _You are the wind beneath my wings… Yo Chuck! Did I ever tell you you're my ….'_

* * *

The convertible sped down the street, headed for the demon karaoke bar. 'You think maybe we should go a bit slower?' Doyle asked, frowning at the speedometer, 'give Cordy time to get to those fury chicks and get them to work their mojo?'

'We don't know what's happening at the club,' Angel replied, not slowing down. 'I can't risk any of my people getting hurt.'

'The way Cordy tells it, it's not them that's at risk, man, it's us. We go in there before the spell is lifted and we're toast. These guys have already tried to kill me once this evening, I'm not relishing the thought of giving them a second crack at it. Especially if I can't defend myself.'

But Angel didn't reply, and he didn't slow down. After a while, Doyle broke the silence, once more. 'Hey, Angel, man, y' think Gunn knew about this? Y' think he was in on it?'

'Why would I think that?'

Doyle shrugged, 'it just seemed like he really didn't want us investigatin' Merl and Sammy's deaths. Maybe he was afraid what we'd find out.'

'I don't think he knew,' Angel said, 'not at first - anyway.'

'But y' think he figured it out - why didn't he say anything?'

'His loyalties are divided right now,' Angel explained to the half demon, 'things had to get to the crunch point before he could bring himself to act.'

'Yeah, well, things are crunching right about now - so what's he gonna do?'

'I don't know,' the vampire admitted, 'we just have to hope that he can work his way through this and figure things out before somebody dies.'

'Before somebody _else_ dies,' Doyle corrected.

'Yeah.' His voice was heavy as he spoke, and with that, the two demons sunk into a silence that lasted all the way to the club.

* * *

The music from the karaoke machine suddenly cut out, and feedback squealed down the wires. Gio dropped the mic in disgust and then jumped off the stage and retrieved his gun. He shot the machine, ending the noise. The ensuing silence was deafening, and it reverberated around the room - oppressing everyone in there. And then one lone voice cut through the still air: 'Miami,' the Host said.

Gio whipped his head around to look at him, 'did you say something to me, green boy?'

'Was three thousand miles really far enough, I wonder? I _know_ why you left.' Lorne got to his feet. Two of the crew members cocked their guns, ready to shoot, but Gio stopped them. He stared at the green demon.

'Why you ran - you couldn't stay there, could you? After what you did - she trusted you.'

'Shut up.' Gio's voice was quiet - and for once he wasn't grinning. Lorne had hit a nerve, got under his skin. No one had been able to touch him since he'd been here - that was part of way he ran away. And he didn't understand how this demon - who he'd never even seen before - could know any of this stuff. But it frightened him.

'Right up until the end,' Lorne said, 'she trusted you.'

Gio hauled back and smacked the Host across the face. The force of the blow made Lorne double over and when he stood back up, his mouth was bloody - but he was smiling. It wasn't his usual, warm, genial smile though. It was darker - much darker. And it made Gio back up a step.

...

One of the demons from the crowd tried, at that moment, to make a break for it. All eyes were on Gio and Lorne and it seemed as good a time as any to escape. But he was caught and hauled back in front of the crew. The grey demon in the corner started up his chant, again, 'oh god oh god oh god - they'll kill us all.'

As the crew aimed at the escapee demon, Gunn spun around and punched out one of the gang, and took his gun. He pointed it at Gio, but all the rest of the crew - even Rondell - levelled their own weapons at Gunn.

'You see that?' Gio asked, he pointed at the demon who had tried to escape, 'he's trying to protect this lowlife. You know what that kind of thing does? It's a baby killer. That's what it is. I seen a lot of them down in Florida.' He walked up to the demon and smiled at him, his evil smile. 'You like to eat babies, don't you?'

'Yeah,' the demon said, he looked at the gun, 'go ahead, see if I care.'

But Gio walked away from him and addressed the room at large, but mostly Rondell. 'And who does he decide to draw down on? The baby killing monster? No, me, that's who - what does that tell you?'

It was Gunn that answered him, still pointing his own stolen weapon at Gio. 'It tells me there's a whole lot of monsters in this room to choose from.'

'Yeah - and maybe you're one of them - they turned you yet, Chuck?'

'Come at me and find out.'

But Gio thought he was onto something now. 'Yeah I think he's one of them - or maybe you just want to be. Yeah, that's more like it. I bet they won't even let you in their little club. Damn, Chuck, you aint even good enough for the vampires and the baby killing monsters. Yeah, that's what I'm guessin'. Wine 'em, dine 'em, stick up for 'em - and they still won't put you on.'

' _Look at you. You're cold and you're hungry, scared and hidin'. You call that living? I can make it all go away, make everything better. Don't you just want all this to stop?'_ Gunn heard his sister's words in his head, remembered the temptation to give into that grief - to embrace the darkness she offered… but that had only been for a moment - over a year ago. That wasn't who he was. 'Shut up,' he said to Gio.

But the other man was on a roll. He thought he's hit the crux of the matter - or he knew that he was hurting Gunn, whichever was most important to him. 'And all that we heard about his sister might not be quite right. He was the only one there to see it, you know what I'm saying?'

In the background, the baby killer demon began to hiss at the crew. 'I'll taste your children…'

'You're the one who let her get vamped in the first place, right, Chuck?'

'Listen to them scream,' said the demon, 'tear off a piece and have me a meal.'

But Gio continued, like he couldn't hear the baby killer. 'Because I know I wouldn't let no blood sucker get that close to my sister!'

_Gunn stood in the smoke filled building and realised his mistake. 'Alonna!' he rushed up the stairs and crashed out into the sunlight just in time to see her grabbed by a man, wearing protective layers of clothing, and wrestled into the back of a van. He chased it down and leapt onto the back. Peering through the window, Gunn could see the vampires feasting on his little sister, tearing into her neck. One of them punched through the window and knocked him to the ground, and Gunn rolled over as he hit the road - watching in desperation as the van squealed around a corner, and disappeared from view._ He hadn't let them take her. He had let his guard down, allowed himself to be tricked and so they had taken her. They had taken her to get to him. Gio knew nothing about him, and he knew nothing about Alonna. But that didn't stop him from saying his piece.

'And then when she was there, all vamped out and hungry,' Gio taunted.

'Tear up their tiny tiny bodies and leave them for husks,' muttered the baby killer.

'You thought you might get that eternal kiss, finally, and when she said "no" that's when you stuck it to her. That's what I'm thinking.'

' _Let me do this for you … let me fix it … say goodbye to everything you ever knew.'_

' _Goodbye.'_

'Shut up,' Gunn said to Gio, his voice laced with a warning.

But Gio was relentless. 'Is that why you started hanging out in here? Is that why you're trucking with the vamps and the demons - hoping you might get a little piece of the action?'

'I said,' Gunn was yelling now, 'shut,' he shot the baby killing demon, 'up!' The demon dropped to the floor, and Fred huddled closer into Wesley's arms.

Lorne looked at the dead body slumped on the ground. 'Not in here,' he said, 'this is a sanctuary.'

'Not anymore it aint,' Gio told him.

'Nice shot,' Angel's voice cut through the room, and Gunn turned. The vampire was stood in the doorway, Doyle by his side - already wearing his demon face. The street fighter sighed to himself, he didn't want this! He'd be made to kill the both of them now. The vampire had better have a trick up his sleeve.

Angel looked at the gun in his friend's hand, and then looked him in the eye. 'Am I next?' he asked.


	12. That Old Gang of Mine: Part Four

The crew turned and looked at the two new arrivals. 'Hey,' Gio looked at Doyle and grinned, 'aint that the creature we were chasing down earlier? He came back for more!'

But Rondell wasn't interested in the small, green demon - it was the vampire he had his eyes on. He put down his firearm and took out a stake, which he handed to Gunn. 'Prove to everyone here that this _thing_ aint no friend of yours.'

Gunn looked at the stake in his hand, and then back up at Angel.

'Gunn, man, you don't wanna do this,' Doyle said to him.

'Nobody's talking to you, spike boy,' Gio said, 'what's with those ugly ass things on your face anyway - is it some kinda demon acne? My boy, Chuck, here is gonna kill himself a vampire, prove, which side he's on - and then he'll take you out too - pinhead.'

Gunn hadn't moved. He was still staring at Angel, who stared right back at him.

'This is madness!' Wesley protested, 'Angel has a soul.'

'He's a vampire,' Gio said.

'With a _soul,'_ Wesley countered.

'Yeah? And what the hell's that thing?' he pointed at Doyle.

'Doyle is half human,' Wesley told Gio, 'he is a person - same as us.'

'You think these things are the same as us?' Gio asked in disgust. 'A vampire is a stone cold killer and whatever that guy is … it's nasty.'

'Angel didn't have his soul when he killed for pleasure,' Wesley replied, 'the same cannot be said for you.'

The whole time, Gunn still hadn't said a word. He kept his eyes fixed on Angel - as if he couldn't hear the argument between Gio and Wesley, or as if he thought it of no importance. Rondell looked impatient. 'So what's it gonna be?' he asked. Gunn tore his eyes away from the vampire and looked down, one more time, at the stake in his hand.

It was Angel that eventually broke the silence. 'Here, Charles, let me make this simple for you.' He took a step closer, 'Doyle already has his other face on - and this -' he morphed into his own vampiric face, 'this is what I am. Take a look at us. And deal with it. Or don't. But make a damn choice.'

* * *

Cordelia sat on the sofa, a cup and saucer balanced in her hand. Across the room from her, the Transuding Furies floated in the air. Their hair and robes seemed to billow in a breeze that wasn't there. This place was majorly weird, and she wasn't too happy at finding herself there. She fixed on her biggest grin, hoping to move the conversation forward. 'So, Angel tells me you go way back.'

_'Mmmm Angel.'_ The three women moaned in unison, their eyes closed, their expressions dreamy - a note of ecstasy rang through their voices as they contemplated the handsome vampire.

'Uh. Yeah.' She really didn't get how Dorky McVampire, Mr. Cheapskate 2001 himself, warranted that reaction. 'So about that sanctorium mojo you got going on at Caritas - any chance you can pull the plug on that. Like now, for instance? Kinda an emergency.'

When the furies replied to her this time, they spoke in turn - each one saying one word and then breaking off to allow their sister to speak.

'You'

'Would'

'Have'

'Us'

'Lift'

'What'

'Has'

'Been'

'Put'

'In'

'Place'

'By'

'Mutual'

'Consent'

'And'

'Contract?'

'People are in trouble,' Cordelia replied, 'Doyle...' she broke off and decided that, though the vampire wasn't her number one concern, it was the ace up her sleeve when it came to these women. 'If you don't, Angel might die.'

_'Mmm Angel!'_

* * *

The hotel was finally empty - the first time in weeks. Gavin sent his bug team round there pronto - dressed up like exterminators in case anyone interrupted them. Not sure how long they would have, the team worked quickly and efficiently...

* * *

The seconds lengthened. The silence heightened. Doyle dropped his red eyes to the floor and looked down at his shoes. Gunn was going to kill them, he thought to himself. There didn't seem to be any way out of it - and when he thought of the things Gunn had been saying the last couple for days, it didn't seem like the man Doyle had always considered a friend would even care. Like he'd said, back at Merl's - back at Sammy's, demons were demons, and the team killed demons all the time. They didn't stop to worry about their feelings - or try to see their point of view. They just killed anything that threatened them. Even Cordelia had a hefty kill count.

Maybe Doyle had been being stupid to think that he and Angel were different, or that humans would consider them to be so. What was two more demons to Charles Gunn - who'd been killing vamps since he was a pre-teen? Sure, he'd fought alongside the two non-humans for months now, over a year in fact. But that might just be because they were good at the job - because Gunn felt he could do more good by their side than he could running scared with a bunch of homeless kids. Didn't mean he had ever forgotten what they were - or accepted it.

And now - now it was no longer convenient to ignore what they were. Gunn's real friends - his human friends - wanted the demons dead to prove a point. If Gunn didn't comply then it would be his own life on the line. How could the lives of just two more demons compare to that? Of course Gunn would kill them. Doyle shut his eyes, and wished he hadn't been wearing his spikes back at the hotel - so he could have kissed Cordelia goodbye. At least she wasn't here to witness this. At least she was safe with the Transuding Furies. It was a shame she hadn't got the sanctuary spell taken down in time, but…

...

Gunn was still staring into the yellow eyes of the vamped out Angel. And then he opened his fist and let the stake clatter to the floor. 'I can't,' he said, 'that's not gonna happen.'

'I knew it!' Gio exclaimed, turning to Rondell in triumph.

'It aint what you think,' Gunn began to protest. 'You think it's because he's my friend…'

'He's your friend?' Rondell interrupted, grabbing hold of Doyle and hustling him forward 'He aint your friend, bro, I am. What about this thing, huh? You gonna tell me this thing is your friend, as well?' He shoved Doyle against the bar and held him there - gripping the front of his shirt. Unable to defend himself, because of the demon sanctuary spell, the Irishman had no choice but to just put up with being manhandled.

'Hey leave it man, he's OK,' Gunn said, pulling Rondell off the half demon.

Rondell spun to face the man he had looked up to more than anyone else, 'he aint OK man!' he protested, 'look at him! He's disgusting - you gonna tell me this _thing_ is your friend too?'

'No.' Gunn replied. 'Doyle aint my friend… he's my brother.' Doyle looked up, surprised.

'He aint your bro, bro - look at him - he's green.'

'Yeah and when he aint green, he's white. Doesn't matter, man, it aint about species or colour, it's about the mission. He's got it - you aint. Angel too. Man, they're willing to fight - maybe even die - to protect people who can't protect themselves. You - you're hunting down things that can't fight back and calling yourself a big man. That aint what we're about - it never was. You lost it… and that's why these guys are my family now. I don't care that they aint human, they aint the ones that act like monsters.'

'Well aint that touching,' Gio interrupted, 'you're all brothers under the skin; the black man, the pale ass vampire, and the little green runt with the weird blue spikes. One big happy family.' He pointed his gun at the three of them. 'So let me get this straight, you think that just because you're letting the monsters live then you got the mission. Well to me, a monster lover aint no better than a monster. And I kill monsters. So anybody wants to walk outta here tonight, they gonna have to show me.' He looked over at where some of the more humanoid looking clientele - including Fred and Wesley - were huddled. 'Come on! Step on up and do what your friend here wouldn't: kill the vampire - and you get to live. Otherwise you die with the rest of them.' He put down his gun and took his crossbow rig from where it had been slung across his back. 'Who wants to live?'

Very slowly, Fred got up from her chair. She looked across at Angel. 'I- I'm sorry,' she said to him, 'I just don't wanna die.'

Gio smiled, and handed her the crossbow.

* * *

'Look,' Cordelia said, putting her cup and saucer down and leaning forward. 'This is really urgent. I know Lorne pays for you to cast this spell. What will it take for you to lift it?'

'This'

'Is'

'Not'

'A'

'Debt'

'You'

'Can'

'Pay.'

The furies bobbed up and down in the air as they spoke, a bit like they were in the water, bobbing on the surface like buoys in the harbour.

Cordelia looked doubtful. 'You don't know that,' she said, 'my credit's been really good this last year.' Ever since Doyle had paid her back what he owed her, she had had a small cushion of savings - and then there had been that disastrous commercial which, humiliating as the memory was, had only boosted her bank balance. And when you worked 19 hour days fighting demons, and spent the other five collapsed on the nearest soft surface, that didn't really leave much time to shop. She was practically fiscally solvent.

But money was not what the furies had in mind.

'Only'

'Angel'

'Is'

'Equipped'

'To'

'Make'

'Good'

'On'

'This'

'Debt.'

'Angel?' Cordelia blew a raspberry, 'For a guy who's a couple of centuries old - not very good with the wise investing.' Then she saw the blissful, dreamy smiles on the women's faces, and wrinkled her nose in disgust - finally getting it. 'And when you say "equipped" that isn't what you mean, is it?'

_'Mmm Angel.'_

'Got it,' Cordelia said, grimacing, 'and also _ew_.'

* * *

Fred accepted the crossbow rig from Gio, she needed both arms to support it. 'I'm sorry,' she said again, 'I just can't die here.' She pointed the bolt at Angel.

He looked at her, 'It's OK, I understand,' he told her.

'Uh - Angel, man…' Doyle said, glancing between Fred and the rig, and the vampire, 'maybe we could - uh - talk about this some more? Fred, sweetheart...'

'Hey, spike face, no one's talkin' to you,' Gio interrupted him. 'You'll get yours, but all in good time - after the lady has taken out the vampire.' He leaned in close to the small woman. 'Alright, now you wanna get it in the heart or else it's no good.' Then he took a step back to give her room. But she didn't fire.

Instead, she swung the rig around so it was pointing at Gio's throat. 'Although, I thought I might just shoot you in the throat instead.'

Wesley and Doyle exchanged a startled glance, talk about a dark horse! 'Dear… sweet…'

'Now if I pierce one of your carotid arteries, considering the temperature in here, 'cause I think someone shot the thermostat...' Fred babbled at Gio - still pointing the rig. Gio stood frozen. '...the blood loss is gonna be heavy.'

It was rather warm in there, Doyle thought. Up until now he had assumed it was fear coupled with his leather jacket that was making him sweat - but Fred might be onto something with that thermostat theory.

'And there's a chance I'll puncture one of your vocal chords,' the tiny woman continued. 'And you won't even be able to scream. You'll want to, though, when the blood loss to your brain results in a cerebrovascular event.' She suddenly looked abashed and glanced around apologetically. 'That's a stroke - I wasn't trying to sound snooty.'

'Fred,' Angel's voice was gentle, 'it's OK, Fred, just point that thing at me. At _me_ , Fred.'

'Why, man?' Doyle asked him, 'she's doin' great!'

Fred glanced back at the two demons, and Gio took that moment to rip the rig out of her hands. He pushed her away, and she staggered back into Wesley's arms. The gang member was just pointing the crossbow at Angel, when the air was lit up by a sudden flash. The vampire looked ceilingward, smiling. 'Thanks, Ladies.'

'Can we fight now?' asked Doyle.

Angel ripped the crossbow out of Gio's hand, hit him with it and then turned on another member of the crew, disarming him.

'I'll take that as a 'yes',' the Irishman said, and then launched himself at the nearest gang member, throwing a punch and then following up swiftly with a head butt. The young man howled in agony, as he clutched his gored face, and Doyle turned to take on the next one. Wesley handed Fred over to Lorne, who ushered her behind the bar, where they both took shelter. The watcher and Gunn then leapt into the fray, fighting alongside their demon team members to take out the human crew.

They young men didn't stand much chance against the team. Although they outnumbered them; Angel had super strength, Doyle had his spikes, and Gunn and Wesley were too well trained and experienced as fighters to be caused any trouble by a handful of humans. Gio began to fall back, he stood in the corner and watched as the crew were taken apart by the four men - well two men and two monsters. 'Come on guys!' he shouted. 'Fight back - it's ten against four! This is pathetic. Hey I'm done with you people. I don't even know why I came out to this coast! L.A sucks. I'm going back to Florida, alright? You're lucky I don't have my old crew…'

Behind him - completely unnoticed amidst his rantings, the grey faced demon - who had prayed to God throughout the siege - began to rise up. His head split slowly in two, and a monstrous, gigantic insect emerged from within and towered above the human. Gio was oblivious. 'I'll drag your ass down to the beach for some sunshine, and toast your…'

The insect bent its neck - real quick - swooping down and biting Gio's head off, mid-sentence. Doyle dropped the man he was punching, to watch as the insect swallowed Gio's head in one gulp. 'Oh - _gross_.'

Rondell picked up his machine gun and fired several rounds into the insect's chest. It fell to the ground - its purple blood splattering up the wall. And then the gun fell silent, and everyone went still.

* * *

'Do'

'Not'

'Return'

'To'

'Us'

'Again'

'To'

'Ask'

'For'

'Us'

'To'

'Undo'

'That'

'Which'

'We'

'Have'

'Already'

'Done.'

The Furies began to float their way to the door, bobbing through the air. Their hair and robes still rippled in the unseen, unfelt breeze. 'Right, no,' Cordelia scrambled her way off the sofa, 'this door is closed, now - gotcha.'

The door was opened for her and she headed on through it. 'Well, thank you - and I'll be telling Angel to come on over here and … repay the debt.' She sounded sick.

_'Mmm Angel.'_

And with that, the door was slammed in Cordy's face. She looked at if for a few moments. 'Yeah … gross.' Then she took out her cell and began to dial, 'that had better have worked - you had better still be alive, Doyle.'

* * *

Wesley helped Fred into the back of a cab, out in the alleyway behind Caritas. Gunn and Rondell were a little further down the alley, talking quietly. Doyle looked between the two groups, feeling awkward and wondering what he should do with himself. He should have stayed inside with Angel and helped apologise to Lorne. It was with great relief that he heard his phone ring. 'Hello?'

'Oh thank god - did it work - are you OK?'

'Yeah, Cordy, we're all fine - we're all alive and everythin'... well not Angel, I guess, but he's no deader than he was before.'

'Great, where are you?'

'Still at the club - I'll see y' back at the hotel, yeah?'

'Yeah - Doyle, try to get back without anyone attempting to kill you on the way, for me?'

He smiled, 'will do, Princess, see you soon.'

He hung up, just as Wesley came over to him. The watcher glanced down the alley at where the two younger men stood. 'I guess they have a lot to discuss, right now.'

'I guess…'

'This has been a tough case.'

'You're tellin' me! I got chased five blocks by gun toting maniacs and three of my acquaintances got killed.'

'Three?'

'Kizzie was already dead when I went to see him, tonight,' Doyle explained.

'Oh - I'm sorry - you'd known him a long time.'

Doyle nodded, even though it was a statement not a question. He had known Kizzie a long time - and he'd always been good for information. As had Merl. The work of Angel investigations was going to be a lot harder from here on out. The crew might have thought they were working the mission, killing the monsters - but some of those monsters had helped the champions of the PTB. This case had been a win for the powers of darkness; humans had been made more brutal in their quest to indiscriminately kill anything that didn't look like them. It only came as a relief, to Doyle, that Gunn hadn't been involved after all, that he didn't care that some of his friends weren't human.

Wesley was frowning down at the smaller man, 'Doyle - the fight is over - why do you still have your spikes on?'

'Oh - I kinda broke my leg earlier. Dislocated a joint. I'm in really quite a lot o' pain, right now.'

'Oh - sorry. But you look ridiculous.'

'Yeah - but it could be worse. I could be any other kind o' demon and then I wouldna been able to snap my leg back into place, and the aforementioned gun toting maniacs would've gunned me down in the street.'

'That's it - look for the silver lining.' Wesley peered towards Gunn and his friend. 'I wonder what they're saying?'

* * *

'I just think we're on different paths, bro,' Gunn said. 'You don't see things my way - and I can't see them yours.'

'Gunn, man, this is your crew - our crew. We built it up together from nothin'. You really gonna walk away and not look back?'

'It's not what I want, Rondell - but you can't be killing demons if they aint a threat to anyone - that aint right.'

'They aint people, G.'

'Yeah? Well then neither are two of my family. And I can't be a part of a crew that thinks my boys' lives are worse less than anyone else's.' He took a deep breath and stuck his hands in his pockets. 'I guess we'll just have to go our separate ways.'

Rondell hung his head. Although he hadn't seen Gunn for months, this was a difficult parting - a final one. To call time on everything they'd been through together was a big deal. But Gunn hung with vampires now, and it was up to Rondell to protect the old neighbourhood, and keep the crew tight. 'All right,' he said.

'Be well.' Gunn clapped him on the back, and then turned and walked away down the alley to where his two teammates stood. He looked a little hesitant when he reached them, and stuck his hands in his pockets, once more. 'Well I guess Rondell and his crew won't be crossing Venice Boulevard again anytime soon.'

'Yes,' agreed Wesley, 'it's never easy - the pull of divided loyalties. Whatever choice we do end up making, we feel as though we've betrayed someone.'

'Yeah.'

'If you ever withhold information or attempt to subvert me again - I will fire you. I can't have any one member of the team compromising the safety of the group, no matter who it is. If you do it again you will be dismissed, bag and baggage, out of a job and onto the streets.' He began to walk away towards the taxi.

'Ah - c'mon, Wesley, bud, there's no need for that,' Doyle protested.

The watcher stopped, but he didn't turn around. 'This is the way it has to be for all of us,' he said, 'there is too much at stake. We have to be able to trust one another one hundred percent, to always be honest - and to not keep vital information from the rest of the group. Lives may depend on it.' Then he got into the taxi, with Fred, and they drove away.

'Are you gonna bust my chops now, as well?' Gunn asked Doyle.

The smaller man shrugged. 'I'm not the boss… and I get this was hard for you….and I'm sorry I doubted y'. Thanks … for what you said in there.'

'No problem - it's the truth, you know that, Irish.'

Doyle nodded, 'yeah - I guess I do.'

Angel came out of the door, joining them.

'How's Lorne?' the half demon asked.

'I left him with a seabreeze, told him we'd come round and help clear up in the morning… he's…. He'll be alright.'

'Hey,' Gunn said, 'I'm sorry about … everything that went on in there. I'm sorry about the way my crew think of you - it's not what I think, but…'

'It's OK,' Angel said, 'I appreciate you not killing me - you could have done.'

'Nah - I couldn't do that to you, man, we're friends.'

'Then we got a problem.'

'Oh, man,' Doyle sighed, rolling his eyes, 'here we go!'

'If you're my friend, Gunn, then there's one thing you gotta be willing to do for me.'

'He just loves this part,' Doyle told the street fighter - his voice halfway between amused and exasperated.

But Angel wasn't deterred. 'One day, the time might come when you have to kill me - and if you're really my friend - you'll prove it by doing so.' Then the vampire swept off with a majestic flourish of his coat.

Doyle and Gunn looked at each other for a moment. The half demon shook his head, wearily, and then trotted on after his friend. 'Holy hell, batman. How is Gunn supposed to kill y' when me and Cordy and Wesley are already lined up to do it? Y'know - you're gonna live to regret tellin' everyone to kill y' at the first sign of you going dark. This is gonna come back and bite you in the butt someday, buddy - you mark my words…'

Gunn smiled to himself as he watched his two demon brothers leave, sniping at each other, and then he walked away.

* * *

The two demons arrived back at the hotel, Angel pulled the car up outside and they both went in through the courtyard. Doyle's limp was less pronounced now, he had begun to heal. 'Are you gonna take your demon face off any time today?' Angel asked him, 'you look ridiculous.'

'That's what Wesley said! … I'll think about going back human when my leg stops hurtin'.'

'You're such a wimp!'

'Hey! I jumped outta window, broke my leg, snapped it back into place - all on my billy no mates - ran five blocks to escape crazy guys with _machine guns,_ leapt over a chain link fence, crash landed on the other side, squashed myself in behind a dumpster and then walked all the way home on my bad leg and then - _and then_ \- I went back out to partake in a fight to the death to save everybody else's ass! I think we can have less o' the "wimp", thank you. I'm a bona fide hero, is what I am'

'You're right - I'll get you a medal.'

'Thanks - I appreciate it - I'd like one shaped like a star - with a green ribbon.'

'I'll see what I can do.'

They entered through the glass doors, and Doyle was immediately pounced on by Cordelia - who flung her arms around his neck, 'you're back!'

'But of course, mon cherie,' Doyle said, morphing back into his human face and kissing her hello. 'You weren't worried were y'?'

'Nah.'

'Oh sure,' said Angel, glancing at Doyle's now spikeless face, 'you go human face for _Cordelia_.'

'Yeah, well,' The Irishman prised himself away from his girlfriend for a moment to squint at the vampire, 'strange as this may sound, bud: I don't have much interest in kissin' you.' He kissed Cordelia again to prove his point.

'Not much,' Cordy said, when she resurfaced, 'but a little bit of interest, right?'

'Hey!'

'It's the coat,' she whispered to Angel, who chuckled. 'He's a sucker for it.'

'Hey! I only have eyes for you, Princess - you know that.' And he kissed her even more enthusiastically to prove his point.

Angel took his coat off, and hung it up by the counter - but he watched the kissing pair, covertly. 'So - uh - are you guys headed back to Cordy's tonight? Or is Cordy going back there alone or…?'

'Man, my leg hurts way too much to go out again, and I'm beat…' he kissed Cordelia and then spoke to her, 'stay here with me?'

'Sure thing.'

'Oh…' Angel put his hands in his pockets, 'well - it's been a long day … I'll just - just say "goodnight" and go on up. Night.'

'Night, Angel.'

'Night, man.'

And the vampire climbed the stairs, alone, only casting a backwards glance once he was on the second floor landing - and the couple couldn't see him. They were still down in the lobby, still kissing…he frowned.

From up here the lobby looked - different, somehow. Like things had been moved around, but only slightly. Maybe Cordelia had tidied up whilst she'd been waiting for them…

The kissing couple broke apart and, arms wrapped tightly around each other, headed for the staircase - and Angel continued on his way up to the top floor, leaving them behind. He closed the door to his suite of rooms, behind him, and dropped down on the bed. After a while he took his clothes off and crawled under the covers - and tried not to think of his friend - a few floors down - doing the exact same thing … with Cordelia.

* * *

'So what happens now?' Cordelia asked, cuddling up against Doyle, in the dark of their room.

'What d'y' mean?'

'Well… Gunn's broken with his crew, Merl is dead, we don't have a snitch anymore, Lorne's place is trashed...what happens now?'

Doyle rolled over and dropped a kiss on her bare collarbone. 'We get up in the mornin' - the sun will be shinin' - and we start a new day. We help Lorne tidy up his place, and we wait for our next client - or my next vision - and we take whatever life throws at us - the way we always do.'

'Yeah?' She wrapped her arm around him, 'and what about you? Are you OK?'

'You mean my leg? Yeah it's fine...'

'No - I don't mean your leg - not that I don't care about that but… I mean, a bunch of humans hunted you down to kill you because you're a demon, are you OK with that?'

'Well, if I never get chased by guys with machine guns again I won't exactly be complaining.'

She smiled, in the darkness, and kissed him. 'Wimp. You know what I mean,' she told him.

'Yeah - I know what you mean… I'm OK.'

'Yeah? It wasn't just another reminder that you're … different?'

'Is that a nice way o' sayin' "not as much of a 'man' as other men"?'

'Yeah.'

'I'm OK… I'm gettin' used to it.'

'Good - me too,' she kissed him again, 'and we don't ever need anyone else… as long as I have you, I'm happy.'

'Likewise.'

* * *

Gunn arrived home, and went into his bedroom. He picked up the picture of Alonna, that he kept by the bed, and looked at it for a long time.

He didn't have much in the way of photographs or possessions of his sister. Their lives hadn't exactly been filled with hallmark moments - and there weren't a whole load of photo ops at the children's homes or out on the streets. But he did have this one - it was a wallet sized, square photo that she'd taken in one of those booths, about two years before...

She'd been doing the rounds at the train station, picking up any loose change she'd found on the floor, checking the vending machines to see if anyone had left any money behind by accident. And she'd done quite well for herself that day - nearly eight bucks. And there had been a photo booth over in the corner of the concourse - and a gang of bratty tweens were all piling in to get their group picture taking, laughing - having fun. And Alonna had wanted some of that. So she had waited until they had cleared out, and then gone into the booth herself and had her picture taken - using half of the money she had found that day.

Gunn had cussed her out when he found out that she had wasted good dough on something so stupid and unnecessary. He'd taken the pictures off her. She never knew that he'd kept them for himself.

He looked down at his sister's smiling, fifteen year old face. It wasn't fair - to lose her like that, before she'd ever had a chance to … And now here he was, moving on up. He had a home, he had a job. He wasn't running anymore, he wasn't scared and he wasn't hungry. But he'd never been able to give her that. She had died and he had turned his back on everything they had had together - without her he hadn't the heart to stay with his crew. And without him, the crew had lost their way. He had let Alonna down.

He put her photo back down on the side. 'I'm sorry,' he said to it.

From the nightstand, fifteen year old Alonna smiled up at him, frozen in time. He switched the light off, and went to sleep.


	13. Carpe Noctem: Part One

Night had fallen over L.A, but the lights still burned in the lobby of the Hyperion hotel. Not that the team were working… there was a hush all over town; no vampires, no visions, no lawyers - nothing. But the longer the phone stayed quiet, the more agitated Cordelia became - and she insisted that they all stay late, just in case - fretting lest they miss a call and a paying client. The bills in her desk drawer were not going to pay themselves.

But nevertheless - despite her willing eagerness to work - there was still a great yawning nothing to do. So she sat on the round sofa, in the middle of the lobby, and flicked through a magazine. Doyle sat up by the counter, a cup of coffee next to him, and his playing cards spread out in a game of clock patience. Gunn leaned on the counter, beside him, playing on his gameboy and Wesley completed the quartet: sitting at a desk and transcribing one of his big old books.

Angel wasn't with them. Not that they cared. But someone did. Fred came wandering down the stairs and sat down on the sofa, beside Cordelia, and leaned over to look at what she was reading. As she felt something move into her personal space, Cordelia jumped up and let out a scream, and then realised that it was only the other woman - who was looking at her apologetically.

On hearing the scream, Wesley had jumped to his feet and looked around. Doyle had twisted himself to look. But Gunn didn't even glance upwards. He just smiled, even as he continued with his game, 'hey Fred,' he said.

'You OK, Princess?' Doyle asked.

'Sure, my heart will stop hammering any minute now.'

'I'm sorry,' Fred said, 'did I startle you guys?'

'No,' Wesley sat back down.

'Only in the sense of shocking and jolting us,' Cordelia replied. 'What's up?'

But the other woman shrugged, and looked around the lobby, casually, as if there was nothing of any particular interest she was after - she was just out for a stroll. 'So you guys are just here - hanging out - reading?' she asked, trying to keep her voice steady and disinterested.

But Cordelia wasn't fooled. 'Angel's upstairs.'

'Oh,' she began to smile - her expression enthusiastic and more than a little dreamy. 'I bet he's reading, too.'

'Not really worth takin' y' up on that bet, darlin'.' Doyle said to her from over by the counter. He frowned as he pulled a card that he couldn't place. 'All the big guy does is read, brood and kill stuff.'

'Sometimes he draws,' Cordelia added.

'Yeah - but not in a healthy way.'

But Fred wasn't too interested in listening to the young couple dissect the vampire - and laugh at him; she was still thinking about the champion, the man who had saved her from the monsters and brought her home. 'He's just so deep y'know?' she sighed. Cordelia and Doyle pulled a face at each other, and tried not to laugh. Fred didn't notice. 'Thoughtful… I'm guessing 'the Brothers Karamazov', Joyce…'

'James Joyce isn't deep,' Doyle interrupted, picking up another card and replacing the impossible one, 'it's just everyone pretends he is so they don't have to admit they don't know what he's talkin' about… I had to study 'Finnegan's Wake' for my Leaving Cert - I know what I'm talking about.'

'How did you do?' Cordelia asked him.

'About as well as I did on my Irish exam.'

'You failed?'

'Uhuh _as Gaeilge_ and in English - I'm a bilingual flunker.'

'But you used to be a _teacher!_ '

'Yeah - in an international school, where I taught eight year olds. Y'don't need proper teachin' qualifications to work in snooty schools - I never really understood that…' he shook his head, 'and anyway, paste and glitter is more my kinda level.'

'Aint that the truth!' Cordy smiled.

But Fred still wasn't listening. She was still dwelling on Angel's reading habits. 'A bit of Proust, or Descartes - and then maybe a little Goethe to round things out.'

'Pretentious not deep,' Doyle coughed, and then looked around - 'I was coughin' - not talkin',' he told the others. Gunn and Wesley chuckled, appreciatively.

'Am I the only one that read this?' Angel demanded, appearing in the hallway at the top of the stairs and looking down at the others.

'If it's Joyce - then no - Doyle read it too, but he's still sore about not understanding it,' Cordelia said, glancing upwards.

'Hey - it's not just me!'

'No - I mean this!' the vampire flapped his newspaper at them.

Cordelia wrinkled her brow, 'well - it doesn't look like a copy of Goethe,' she said to the others. The men all smirked.

'What?' Angel looked nonplussed, and then shook his head and ran down the stairs, still wagging the paper at them. 'No - this - Charlton Heston, double feature. At the nu-art - "Soylent Green" and "The Omega Man".'

'Wow', Gunn sounded distinctly underwhelmed, and didn't bother to even look up from his gameboy.

But Angel looked around eagerly. 'It's two for one. Did I mention, Charlton Heston? Who's in?'

Fred jumped to her feet and raised her hand, beaming. 'Sounds great.'

'Great! Wesley?'

The British man shook his head. 'I'm in the middle of translating my copy of Fassad's guide from the original Sumerian.'

'Gunn? Cordy?' But those two didn't even look up. 'Doyle?'

'I'm washing my hair.'

Angel rolled his eyes and went to grab his coat. 'Well, Fred, looks like it's just you and me.' The woman beamed so hard it looked like her face might split in half. The vampire cast one last look around the lobby at his associates pretending to be busy. 'Well the worm has certainly turned.'

Fred began to giggle, 'yeah - the worm is turning and…' the smile suddenly slid from her face and she looked worried, 'am I the worm?'

'Angel's the worm,' Doyle interrupted, picking up another card and frowning again.

Angel gave him a dirty look, and then turned back to Fred. 'No. You may not know this Fred but certain friends and co-workers have been known to accuse _me_ of being the quiet, stay at home, sulky one.' All four of his friends stopped what they were doing to turn and look at him in disbelief. 'Some people just don't know how to have fun anymore,' Angel said, as he and Fred left the hotel.

* * *

Marcus lay back in the double emperor King bed and wrapped his arms around the two women that shared it with him. They were in an expensive hotel room, and there was a large mirror reflecting the scene right back at them. 'Can we take a breather, stud?' one of the women asked. He nodded and turned to the other - but she needed a rest too. So he got out of the bed, and went to pour himself a martini.

He admired Woody's body - his body, right now - in the mirror, flexing his muscles at himself. 'Mm - it's good to be young,' he turned back to the women, 'ready for round four?' But before he could rejoin them on the bed, he suddenly hunched over, doubled up in pain.

'You OK baby?' one of the women asked.

Marcus shrugged. 'Well, it's been fun - _Alli permutat anima kimota, alli permutat anima kimota, alli permutat anima kimota._ ' A stream of red-white energy began to emanate from his eyes and mouth, and then dissipate into the atmosphere. The women watched, open mouthed as - just for a moment - Woody looked at them in confusion. And then his body began to steam, and sink inwards - like a balloon deflating. Before their very eyes, the body of Woodrow Raglan melted down into nothing but a puddle of skin and fell limply to the floor.

* * *

'You think maybe we should have gone along last night?' Doyle asked. He and Cordy were sitting on the stairs, peering into the office, where Fred was talking to Wesley about her fantastic date with Angel the night before.

'Are you kidding - and made it a double date? Way to make things even more complicated.'

'Maybe just one of us should have gone?'

'Like a tragic third wheel?'

'Well - we gotta do something…'

'I'll get Angel to handle it,' Cordelia assured him.

'Yeah, right, let me know how that pans out for y'.'

Cordelia blew her cheeks out and sighed, 'yeah, well - you're right - we gotta do something.'

* * *

'And he opened every door for me and paid for the tickets. And even bought a giant popcorn,' Fred was telling Wesley, 'and every so often he'd do this,' she mimed holding out a bucket of popcorn to an invisible person sitting next to her, 'because he wanted me to know it was OK for me to have some.' She sat down and sighed, 'and he's so lonely because he's the last man on earth.'

Wesley looked confused, 'Angel?'

But that made Fred laugh - no she was talking about Charlton Heston in the Omega man. Because Omega was the last letter in the Greek alphabet, so it was like a metaphor. She jumped back to her feet. 'And he walks on the street side, not the building side. It's old fashioned, but kind of chivalrous, y'know?'

'And we're back to talking about Angel?' Wesley hazarded a guess.

'Right. And even though he didn't talk a lot, it was still OK. it was comfortable. It wasn't that awkward kind of quiet. You know that awkward kind of quiet?'

There was a moment of silence, whilst Wesley just stared at her. Then he shook his head, 'that's never happened to me, no.'

* * *

'Just look at him sitting there!' Doyle hissed, nodding his head towards Angel, who sat in the lobby reading today's paper. 'Big heartbreaking jerk, reading his paper like nothin's happened.'

Cordelia frowned, 'what did he do, not swish his coat around enough for you? How'd he break _your_ heart?'

'Not mine - Fred's!'

'Oh please,' Cordelia blew a raspberry, 'you give him too much credit for being on the same planet as the rest of us. El Dorko Vampiro over there doesn't even know what he's doing. The giant goofball has no idea about the effect he has on impressionable, young women.'

Doyle glanced at his girlfriend, wrinkling his forehead in concern. 'Well, does he have an effect on you?'

'Yeah - he makes me wanna barf! Come on - let's talk to him.' She grabbed the Irishman's hand and dragged him up to his feet, and then marched him across the lobby so they could both loom over the seated vampire.

Angel looked up at them, 'uh - hey guys - how's it going?'

'We need to talk,' Doyle started, but Cordelia interrupted him. 'No - _you_ need to talk,' she said to Angel, 'to Fred.'

Angel looked between the young couple in confusion, 'what about?'

The pair exchanged an exasperated glance. 'About the big date you guys went on last night!' Cordelia told him.

'Woah! Date? It was just a movie.'

'Two movies,' Doyle corrected, 'which you paid for, Mr. big shot, plus popcorn and a romantic moonlit stroll home.'

'What? Way to over-read a situation!'

'Yeah - which is why you need to talk to her!' Cordelia said, 'she's in there right now going on and on about what a super time you guys had.'

Angel shuffled his paper, and held it up so he could read it again - trying to effectively shut down the discussion, 'she's just enthusiastic,' he said, 'don't worry about it.'

Doyle reached out, and squashed the top of the paper down, so he could see Angel's face, again. The vampire looked aggrieved. Meanwhile, Cordelia knocked his feet off his footstool and sat down on it so she was on his level. Angel sighed - just for the effect of it - but Doyle and Cordy were merciless. Cordelia fixed him sternly in her sights. 'She's got the big puppy love - and who can blame her?'

'I sure can't,' Doyle said.

Cordelia laughed and swatted at him with the back of her hand - hitting his upper leg, as he was still standing. 'I'm serious!' she said, going back to Angel, 'it's understandable; you're handsome and brave and heroic…' Angel began to grin to himself, enjoying her words.

Doyle looked worried, 'uh - what happened to him making you want to barf?'

But Cordelia wasn't finished. '... emotionally stunted, erratic, prone to turning evil and - let's face it - practically a eunuch.'

'I am not a eunuch!' Angel protested in outrage, whilst Doyle burst out laughing. 'Hey - this isn't funny! I'm not - how can you say that?'

'It's just a figure of speech.'

'Find a better one.'

'I just mean that sex is a no-no for you,' she said.

'Which is a real shame, bud, gotta admit I kinda like it.'

'Whatever,' Angel huffed, 'like you would know - I've had more women than ... I invented some of the classics!'

Doyle and Cordy exchanged another glance - this one doubtful, 'yeah - OK,' Cordelia said, 'whatever makes you feel better _in the now_ \- but the fact is, you know perfect bliss, you go evil.'

'Doesn't always happen,' Angel sulked.

'Aw - y' not gonna give us the whole Darla, moment of perfect desperation talk again are you?'

'Despair,' corrected the vampire, 'it was perfect _despair_.'

'Right - followed by an epiphany. Sex is a rollercoaster with you, bud, better leave it to the rest of us - those of us that are mature enough to, y'know,' he whistled, 'handle it.'

'I'm mature!'

'Sure you are,' Cordelia agreed, 'which is why you're gonna go in there and maturely chat with little Fred. Listen, I'm telling you, if this thing isn't nipped in the bud, it's gonna go bad.'

'Like a rotten apple.'

'Thank you, Doyle.'

Doyle nodded at her, and she breathed a laugh, shaking her head at his hopelessness. But Angel had begun to nod. 'OK, mature chat - how soon can you guys get on that?'

'Nice try buster,' Cordelia said, she pointed at the office, 'in.' She got to her feet, and between them, she and Doyle bundled the vampire over to Wes's office. 'Angel has something he would like to say,' Cordelia announced when they reached the door.

Angel looked at Fred, who smiled up at him; and over to Wesley, who looked at him, expectantly. He opened his mouth to say something, and then raised his paper instead. 'Hey, did anyone read this?' he asked. He lay the paper out on the desk so everyone could see it. 'Police found the body of twenty six year old Woodrow Raglan in a two bedroom suite at the Elondria hotel. Unnamed witnesses said it was just like his insides…'

'...collapsed,' continued Wesley, reading, with a frown. 'You know there was something else like this last week.' He got up and started to root through some papers on the side.

Cordelia looked annoyed. 'Hello! No one is hiring us to look into this..'

'And I'm more than happy to report no visions of collapsin' innards from the big guys upstairs.'

'...so could we not be doing more important things?' Cordelia finished, trying to give Angel a pointed and meaningful look. He refused to be looked at, though, and focused intently on Wesley's search - blankly ignoring the arched eyebrow and tilting head that was trying to guilt him into having an uncomfortable conversation. Eventually, the watcher found what he was looking for and brought it over to the others. It was a newspaper clipping that reported that ten days ago another such deflated body had been found in another hotel room.

'So what do you think?' Angel asked him, 'spell, curse - serial demon?'

'Maybe it's like that burrower sex demon y' killed that one time,' Doyle suggested, 'fits the same kind o' pattern and it's just as … disgustin'.'

'Whatever it is, it may be worth a closer look,' Wesley said.

'I'll say,' agreed Angel, 'Cordelia open up a case file, we have to get on this right away.'

She opened her mouth to protest, but Angel just handed her the paper and the clipping and strode out of the office. She cast an irritated glance at Doyle and Wesley and then scurried after the vampire, 'Angel…!'

* * *

As Lilah walked down the corridor towards her office, Gavin Park fell into step with her. 'Good morning, Lilah.'

'Good morning,' they took a few more steps and then stopped, 'well, here we are outside _my_ office. Bye, Gavin.'

But Gavin only smirked at her, 'you know you're a tough one,' he said. 'But I'm going to earn your respect - give me a little time. You'll see I'm a creative guy.'

Lilah snorted, 'oh - like your 'let's torture Angel with building code violations' idea? So Machiavellian! Let's drown him in red tape.'

She still didn't get under his skin, though, didn't wipe the smirk off his face. 'There are other levels to this, Lilah… Avenues of interest I have, one of them being: does Angel even exist?'

Lilah looked irritated, 'are you getting metaphysical on me?'

He chuckled, a complacent, annoying kind of chuckle. 'No! I mean, he has no social security number, no taxpayer id, no last name - as far as I know. How can he just go down to the building department? Or anywhere else in officialdom for that matter? He's the rat and we're the maze. Don't you wanna see what he'll do next?

'Maybe he'll just rip your throat out.'

'You think he'd really do something that cliched?' Gavin laughed again, 'maybe you don't know him as well as you think.' He walked away, and Lilah watched until he was out of sight. Then, instead of entering her office, she went over to speak to her secretary.

'Get Carter Williams on the phone.' The secretary just stared at her, blankly. 'The graphic artist?' Lilah said, still nothing. She sighed, 'look under F for forger.' If Gavin was going to be naive enough to tell her his plans, then he'd better believe that she would stomp right over them. The little real estate weasel wasn't going to get her respect any time soon. You kept your cards close to your chest at Wolfram and Hart, any idiot should know that. Sometimes - she really missed Lindsey.

* * *

Night had fallen once more, and the team were gathered in the lobby. Cordelia took the printout from the printer and took it over to the rest of them. Wesley was talking, 'there was a third victim, five weeks ago. They were all healthy, young males. They all died in expensive hotel rooms.'

'Can you imagine shelling out all that money for a fancy suite, and then - kerplop! You're a big bag of mush bones?' Fred mused. The others stared at her, and she looked back at them, '...I guess it wouldn't be good wherever that happened…'

'Right,' agreed Doyle, 'Wes, you were sayin'?'

'I was thinking Gunn could interview the staff of the hotels where it happened?' he glanced at the street fighter, who nodded. 'I'm meeting a contact of mine from the coroner's office in about thirty minutes, see what I can find out about the bodies.'

'Well, they were all members of the same gym,' Cordelia told them all, placing the printout down, 'the bodies - when they weren't - dead ones.'

'Right, me Cordy and Doyle can check out the gym, then,' Angel said, grabbing his coat.

'Man, I hate gyms,' grumbled the half demon, 'can't I go see the coroner with Wes?'

'Come on, little Irish man - come with me - and spend the evening feeling inadequate next to glistening hunks of male musculature,' Cordelia smiled at him, picking up the car keys.

'But you only love me, right?' he asked her, as they headed out the door.

'Ask me again when we get back from the gym.' The pair of them left, with Angel trailing behind.

'Meet back here later?' Wesley asked Gunn. The other man nodded, and they both left the hotel, as well, bound for their respective tasks.

Fred was left alone in the middle of the lobby. 'I'll just stay here, then,' she laughed and then looked around, 'OK, that's what I'll do.'

* * *

Cordy and Doyle walked into the health club, holding hands. Angel trailed a little behind them, but that didn't stop them from talking to him over their shoulders. 'You have to talk to Fred,' Cordelia was saying - they really weren't letting this drop, no matter how much the vampire tried to deflect. It felt like he'd come out with his parents, the way they were berating him. 'You have to explain to her - that there is your business life and your social life and everyone knows you keep those two things separate.'

Angel stared pointedly down at the couple's clasped hands, 'oh, yeah, right - like you guys do?'

'I'm a total pro, bud,' Doyle replied, 'and I don't appreciate the insinuation.'

'Yeah right,' Angel and Cordelia scoffed in unison.

'Ah - I can pretend.'

'But things are different for me and Doyle than they are for you and _any_ woman. Because we're not superfreaks. We're allowed to mix a little business with pleasure. You, on the other hand, are not allowed any pleasure. At all. Now - go talk to someone who works here, we'll go chat up some of the clientele.'

'When y' say chat up….?' asked Doyle, as she dragged him away.

Angel made his way over to one of the gym attendants and began to ask him some questions. After lowering his brow and asking about steroids, and suggesting that they keep things between themselves, he managed to convince the employee to let him look at the files of the three men.

Meanwhile, Cordelia had entered the weight room. Doyle lurked outside, peeking through the little windows in the doors to see how she was getting on. The men she was talking to were buff - and tall. They were always tall, Doyle reflected gloomily. But these ones had rippling biceps, as well as being blessed with height; and they had abs, and pecs, and glutes, and a whole load of muscles that the Irishman didn't even know the names of. And their skin shone with perspiration under the fluorescent lights.

'So did you ever see anyone who looked suspicious,' Cordelia was asking, 'or really pale? Or maybe green and scaly?' The two men looked at one another. Out in the corridor, Doyle rolled his eyes.

...

'There's nothing that I can see that connects these guys,' the gym attendant said - looking at the files, 'except that they all took the same Pilates class.'

'Pilates, is that like Tae-bo?'

The employee laughed,'yeah, if you're living in 1999.'

Angel thanked him, and made his way to the room where the Pilates class was held. There was a whole load of people in there, stretching and contorting themselves into weird positions. At the front, the instructor began to speak, 'relax your neck and shoulders, using your lower abdominals, bring the spine down to the floor…'

The door opened again, and Angel saw Doyle enter the room.

'... take a deep breath in, and as your arms come up to the ceiling….'

Doyle whistled, 'man, these places are nuts,' he said to Angel, 'did y' find anything? Can we go now?'

'Where's Cordelia?'

'Havin' the time of her life in the weight room, with Andre the Giant's more muscular brothers.'

'You just left her?'

'She's workin' - anyway,' he shook his head, 'she isn't really into that stuff. But I guess it's nice to look once in a while.'

'I don't think she's the only one looking,' Angel said, 'you see that?' He pointed out of the window, where, across the road, light was reflecting off two small circles in a window.

'Is that binoculars?' Doyle asked, 'A peepin' Tom?'

'Could be.' The vampire read the sign outside the building - the Monserrat retirement community. 'I reckon we should check it out.'

'The gym and an old folks home? Gee, this is my best night ever. I better tell Cordy we're off.'

...

Cordelia was now surrounded by a whole host of handsome, muscular men, by the time Doyle reappeared in the weight room. He cleared his throat, awkwardly, 'uh - Princess? Me and Angel are gonna go check something out at a retirement home in the next street.'

'You just can't get out of here fast enough, can you?'

'You know gyms make me nauseous - have fun - and pick us up when you're done, yeah?'

'OK, chicken little,' she gave him a quick kiss, 'see you later.' He walked off and she turned back to the group of weight lifters. 'He's just someone I work with,' she said.

* * *

The two men entered the retirement home and padded, stealthily, down the hallway - hoping not to get found by an orderly. 'It must be a room on the right side,' Angel whispered, 'to overlook the gym - probably one of the middle ones.'

'So what do we do? Start knockin' on doors?'

The vampire nodded, 'you start that end, we'll meet in the middle.' They separated out and began to knock on doors, Doyle knocked on 322, Angel on 310. Neither found anything of interest, though it was Angel who left his room first. He worked his way down to the next one. There was an old lady in there - and she seemed lonely. He found himself stuck, chatting.

Doyle left 322, and checked on 320. Still nothing of any interest. There was no answer at 318, so he proceeded to 316. The name on the door said Marcus Roscoe. He knocked.

...

Marcus shuffled his way over to the door, grumbling. It was kind of late for visitors. He opened it and looked out. There was a short guy in an ugly shirt standing at the other side. Young - but not Marcus's type. Not only did this fella lack inches, but he was also lacking in the muscle department. He made up for it in the beer belly and chest hair department, though. The old man stared at the young one, 'what?' he asked.

'Hi. Mr. Roscoe? My name is Doyle, I work for…'

'Not interested.' Marcus slammed the door shut in his face.

...

'O-kaay,' Doyle said, looking at the closed door. Down the corridor, the door to room 312 opened, and Angel began to back out. 'Sure - I agree ma'am, your children should visit you more often.'

'Well even just a phone call now and again would do.'

'Yeah, well, uh - kids today….'

'They shut you up in a dusty old mausoleum and wait for their inheritance.'

'Yeah - well - it's getting late - I hope your budgie's OK, Mrs. Wellman, and that the doctor can sort out that - rash - thing… Night.'

The vampire scurried on down to the hall towards Doyle, who had been listening to their conversation and chuckling. 'You havin' trouble?' The Irishman asked.

'She's just lonely - any luck?'

'Nothin' so far - but Mr. 316 wouldn't let me get my foot in the door - so…'

'So maybe he's the peeping Tom?'

'It's a theory.'

'OK, I'll use my famous people skills to try and get 316 to talk to me - you check out 314 for me.'

Doyle nodded and moved on the next room. He knocked and after a moment was granted entry. Angel turned back to door 316, and raised his fist.

* * *

Marcus was cussing before he even opened the door this time. He yanked it open, 'i already told you…' and then he cut himself off. It was a different man this time. This one was young, like the last one - but unlike the last one, this guy was tall. He had a prominent brow and a strong jawline, penetrating eyes and great hair. He wore a long, dark trench coat that would look ridiculous on over ninety percent of the population, but this guy carried it off. This man had potential - whereas the last one had been a dud. 'Can I help you?' Marcus asked.

'Mr Roscoe? My name is Angel,' he handed the old man a business card, and Marcus took it, examining the name and logo. 'Would it be alright if I asked you a few questions?' Angel asked. 'It shouldn't take long.'

The old man walked away from the doorway, but left the door open, as if he expected Angel to follow him inside. Angel remained on the threshold, trapped by the invisible barrier. When he realised he hadn't been followed, Marcus turned back, 'well come on in if you're coming.'

And Angel stepped into the room and closed the door behind him. He walked to the window and looked out, he could see the gym - and the Pilates room - across the way. 'Nice to have a view,' he said, 'gives you something to look at, bet you enjoy it.'

'Not so much,' said Marcus. They both looked at the binoculars sat on the window ledge, and the old man shrugged. 'Well - I figure there's no harm in looking. That's about all I can do anymore. Uh - what do you want?'

'Your help,' Angel pulled out the newspaper clippings with the pictures of the dead men. 'I was wondering if you'd seen these guys, across the way, at the gym.'

Marcus flipped through them, but shook his head. 'I'm more of a girl watcher … jeez they all died? How?'

'That's what I hope to find out.' He glanced around the room and noticed something on a shelf. 'Nothian herb jar?' the vampire said, picking it up, 'that's a pretty exotic item. Do you dabble in the occult?'

'Occult shmoccult,' Marcus replied, taking the herb jar back and putting it on the shelf. 'I travelled a lot, picked up some trinkets.'

Angel was looking around again, he frowned when his eyes fell on an extreme sports magazine. 'You do a lot of bungee jumping, Mr. Roscoe?'

'More than you might think, Mr. Angel.'

'It's just Angel.'

'I'll remember that.' Marcus took his glasses off and slipped them into his breast pocket. Then he took a step closer to Angel. _'Alli permutat anima kimota. Alli permutat anima kimota…'_

Angel began to chuckle, 'you might wanna think twice before you cast a …' But then he stopped, as red-white energy began to stream from Marcus' mouth and eyes. A moment later the vampire felt a strange, lurching sensation - like he was being ripped out of himself - and blue-white light began to stream from his own face. The energy beams crossed in midair and then poured themselves into the opposite man.

The old man now gazed at the young man, squinting and looking confused. 'You _are_ me,' he said.

And then the young man grabbed the old one by the shoulders, head butted him, and dumped the unconscious body on a chair. 'That's gonna smart, later,' he said. And then Marcus, now wearing Angel's body, walked out of the retirement home and out onto the street.


	14. Carpe Noctem: Part Two

'Uh - _Hello!_ '

Marcus was interrupted, as he sauntered down the street in his brand new body, by an irritated female voice. He turned to look. An absolute _stunner_ of a woman was sitting in the driver's seat of a shiny convertible, and looking at him like she expected something. 'Well, _hello_ ,' Marcus smiled back at her.

'So what did you find out at the old folks home?' she asked.

'Uh - nothing.' He waited a beat, as he thought of something to say. He remembered the business card - this guy was a private investigator, looking into the suspicious deaths of those three men. 'Didn't pan out,' he told her. 'What about you?'

'Free trial membership and - don't tell Doyle - but a whole raft of phone numbers.' Then she sighed and shrugged, 'OK, I got nothing. There's nothing to tell.'

'Well it seems like we're barking up the wrong tree here,' Marcus said, pleased that they had no apparent reason to come back to the neighbourhood.

'Yeah well - get in - I'll take you back to the hotel.'

Marcus grinned and hopped into the passenger seat. He put his arm around the back of Cordy's seat and smiled at her. 'Great - you and me - off to the hotel - huh?' He'd picked a winner here!

'Yeah,' she said, and then looked back round towards the retirement building, 'what happened to Doyle?'

'Doyle?' the name seemed familiar for some reason. And then it all became clear, as short, chest hair guy walked out of the home and climbed into the back of the car, without so much as a by your leave.

'How come you left me, bud?' he asked the man in the front seat.

Marcus frowned. Things made less sense than they had a moment ago. It got worse when ugly shirt man leaned forward and kissed the complete knockout, a brief peck on the lips. 'So, y' have a good time at the gym?' he asked her.

'Yeah - I'm running away with a bodybuilder called… Bruno.'

He kissed her again, 'you are? That sounds … alliterative.' Then he pulled back and spoke to both of them. 'So are we off to the hotel now or what?'

In the passenger seat, Marcus frowned even deeper. So ...what? This was like - a three way? - With himself, the goddess, and the littlest pimp? They had to lose the third wheel before they got to the bedroom. This was not the kind of odd number action he was into...

* * *

Marcus stood in the centre of the lobby and looked around in appreciation, taking in the high ceilings, the chandelier, and the grand staircase. 'Nice,' he said, grinning. But his smile flipped upside down when Cordelia walked behind the counter, 'are you supposed to be back there?' he asked. He hopped onto the stool in front of the desk and rang the service bell, 'ding ding, paying customers, hellooo!'

Doyle, who was leaning against the front desk, beside Marcus, frowned at him. 'What are y' doin'?' He took out his playing cards and began to shuffle them, as he waited for Cordelia to collect her purse.

Angel was off, he thought to himself - nothing alarming but… he seemed to be in a really _really_ good mood. Well, that was kind of alarming in and of itself. Doyle really didn't like Angel when he was happy. Plus, the half demon had noted the way that the vampire had had his arm around Cordelia the whole drive home. Not wrapped tight around her, so that she would notice, but resting on the back seat - like a kid at a drive-in movie, who was waiting for the scary scenes so he could make his proper move.

Cordy might not have felt it - but from the back seat it was all too clear what it looked like. Why would Angel be coming onto Cordelia? But that was how it had looked to Doyle. And - now he thought about it - the conversation on the way home had been off, too. Like Angel was trying to shut Doyle out of it, like he was only talking to the woman driving the car. And now here he was playing silly beggars at the counter? Nope - Doyle didn't like it.

But, unconcerned by the inner turmoil of the half demon beside him, Marcus was still gazing around the lobby - wondering what was taking so long. 'Slow night, huh?' he said - meaning there weren't any other guests in view - and clearly the staff were on a break.

'Yeah,' Cordelia agreed, from behind the desk, 'but maybe Wes or Gunn found something.'

'Wes or Gunn?' There were five of them now? Four men? And only _one_ woman? What was going on here, had he walked into some weird, inverted Mormon cult?

'I wonder if they've been back here, yet?' Doyle said.

Cordelia shrugged, 'if they have then they didn't find anything - they would have left a note.'

She put her purse down on the counter top, which drew Marcus's attention. Next to her bag was a stand of business cards - all for Angel Investigations. He looked at them, there were five different types. Some had the name 'Wesley Wyndam Pryce' printed on, others said 'Charles Gunn', there was a stack of 'Francis Doyle' cards, another of 'Cordelia Chase' ones and then finally some that just had the business name. Those ones were the same as the one he had been handed back at the old folks home - the ones the real Angel used.

Marcus sighed to himself. 'They're a great part of our investigating team,' he said quietly. But not quietly enough that Doyle didn't give him a funny look. Marcus looked around the lobby again, 'working with us here in this old, abandoned hotel.' Clearly, things were not as they had first seemed, he hadn't picked a good one after all. But the body was still good - handsome - whatever Angel's real circumstances, Marcus could make use of his good looks. 'Cordelia,' he said to her, 'have I ever told you you are a _very_ beautiful woman?'

'Ha!' she snorted with laughter, 'yeah right.'

At the other side of the counter, Doyle looked bemused. 'Why on earth would y' tell her that, bud? It's kinda my job, yeah?' Then he looked at his girlfriend, 'we staying at your place tonight?'

'Well, I am - you can come along if you want but… it's gonna be awkward what with Buddy being there and everything.'

'Bruno,' Doyle corrected her, 'your imaginary bodybuilder's name is Bruno and…' he stretched his arms out and cracked his knuckles together, 'I think I can take him.'

She picked up her purse and joined him at the front of the counter, they wrapped their arms around each other and began to leave. Marcus looked on in disbelief, he stared down at the tall, muscular body he was wearing and shook his head. He didn't get it. Angel looked the way he did and yet it was the short, out of shape, badly dressed guy that got the girl? What was wrong with the man?

'Oh - and don't think you're getting out of that talk with Fred,' Cordelia threw over her shoulder, as she reached the front door.

'Talk with Fred?' Marcus asked. The couple turned and looked back at him.

'Yes! Just keep it simple,' the woman advised, 'one: you're not like other men, two: there's no room for romance in the workplace.'

'Three: your waay too cheap to take someone out to dinner,' Doyle joked.

'Romance ...with Fred … so I'm…' Marcus glanced down at the tasteful, well cut clothes he wore, 'of course I am.'

'Get some rest,' Cordelia said to him, 'we'll see you tomorrow.'

And Marcus watched, as the goddess and the leprechaun left the hotel together to have the kind of fun that he, Marcus, was supposed to be enjoying.

* * *

Angel woke up, slumped in a chair. He felt strange - he was in pain. His head hurt, like he'd been hit, but that was nothing new. But there was more to it than that. He ached - all over - and in a way that he had never experienced before. And he felt stiff in his joints. Aches and stiffness often followed a serious beating, until his vampire healing cured him quickly enough, but this was a different kind of pain. He hadn't been beaten - and yet he still ached. And he felt weary, too. And the room was all blurry.

He tried to stand up - and failed. He tried again, but he just couldn't make it. He rested his arms against the arms of the chair and pushed himself upwards. His arms felt different too - weaker - frail. There wasn't the strength that he was accustomed to coursing through them.

Once on his feet, he shuffled over to the mirror. There was a reflection in it - which straight away was wrong - but the image was blurry. He found some glasses in his breast pocket and put them on - and Marcus Roscoe's face came into focus.

...

Creeping through the deserted reception area of the retirement home, Angel found what he was looking for - a payphone. He picked up the receiver and began to dial. After a few rings he heard Cordelia's voice: 'You've reached the offices of Angel Investigations - we help the helpless. If that's you, leave a message after the tone.' The machine had picked up. Angel began to talk. 'Cordelia? Are you there? Pick up!'

His heart leapt as he heard the phone get picked up at the other end, and then sank, as he heard his own voice speaking to him. 'Hey, Angel,' Marcus said, 'how's my head? I hope you put some ice on it. You know, you got a pretty sweet deal here? Love the hotel - and Cordelia? That is how I spell w-o-m-a-n. But you're not utilising it, buddy. Hey - you think I can make time with her like this - or do I need to take the Irish guy's body to get a piece of the action? He's not my usual - but to get a crack at a girl like Cordelia? I'll do anything!'

'You leave them both alone!' Angel demanded, 'you hear me?'

'Hey - don't worry about it,' Marcus grinned, 'you don't need to worry about anything, except eating nice soft foods and staying out of Ryan's why.'

'Ryan?'

As he spoke, he felt the phone be taken out of his hand. An orderly was frowning at him. 'You wouldn't think that we just talked about this.' He hung up. Angel opened his mouth to protest, but the man wasn't listening. 'There go your phone privileges for the rest of the month.'

...

Back at the hotel, Marcus took the tape out of the answering machine, and smashed it. Ryan had got a hold of Angel. Angel was trapped. Marcus was safe.

...

Ryan was walking the old man back to his room, 'you know you're not supposed to be out of your room at this hour,' he said.

'I was just stretching my legs,' Angel told him.

Ryan put his hand over his name badge, 'who am I?' he asked.

'You're Ryan.'

'Well - at least you're not having another episode. A word of advice, Marcus. Next time you start thinking you're a 24 year old stud, or a pro-skateboarder, keep it to yourself - unless you want to end up in iso and restraints again.'

Angel pointed to himself, 'I know who _I_ am.'

'Right, then it's back to beddybies for you.'

* * *

Cordelia was kissing Doyle, enthusiastically, but he was only halfhearted in return. 'I'm worried about Angel,' he said to her, between kisses.

'Why?' she kissed him again.

'Did he seem - off - to you, on the way home?'

'Do we have to talk about this now?'

'Why did he call you beautiful?'

'You don't think I'm beautiful?' She arched an eyebrow at him.

' _I_ do - but..'

'I'm not Angel's type,' Cordelia finished, 'yeah - I guess he was weird. But that's nothing new, besides…' she began to unbutton his shirt, 'we can't do anything about it now.' She took off her own top, 'so why don't we do something else, instead?'

'Uhuh - and this sudden friskiness wouldn't have anythin' to do with our trip to the gym - and the gleaming hunks of male musculature you were exposed to tonight, would it?'

She wrinkled up her nose, and laughed, ' _ew_ \- no!' she kissed him again, 'I only like you.'

'Well,' he grinned, 'OK then,' and he wrapped his arms tightly around her and pushed her down onto the bed, giving into her ministrations with enthusiasm...

...But afterwards - his mind turned back to Angel. 'Cordy?'

'Mmm?'

She was nearly asleep, so he took hold of her shoulder and shook her slightly, 'Cordelia?'

She woke up with a snort. 'What? _Doyle_ \- I was sleeping.'

'I'm still thinking about Angel.'

She kept her eyes closed, and hugged her pillow, tightly. 'Well if you want to leave me for him, I'll understand,' she murmured, 'he's very handsome.'

'That isn't what I meant, Cordelia, and you know it.' He wrapped his arms around her waist and dropped a kiss on her bare shoulder. 'But there's somethin' funny about him - and that never bodes well for the rest of us.'

'Well - we'll keep an eye on him tomorrow,' her speech was still slurred, like she was half asleep, 'can I go to sleep now?'

He kissed her shoulder again, 'yeah - OK - I'll shut up. See you in the morning.'

'Night Doyle.'

* * *

When they arrived at the hotel, the next morning, they seemed to be the first people there. Cordelia went to her desk and switched on her computer, Doyle went and switched on the coffeemaker, and then Cordy took the case file through into Wesley's office. 'Angel?' the vampire was slumped over the desk - he jerked awake, bits of paper stuck to his face. The office manager stared at him, 'what happened?'

'Uh - hey doll - I was… working the case,' Marcus said. He pulled the paper off his face and put it inside a folder, 'I must have dozed off.'

Cordelia wrinkled her nose up - had Angel just called her "doll"? 'You were too tired to go up to your room?' she asked.

'My room - right, which I have upstairs. Well you know me - always giving a hundred percent.' He got to his feet and began to sort through the mess on his desk, 'now where did I put that damn case file?'

'You gave it to me, yesterday,' Cordelia said, quietly.

'Right - ha ha, must be getting old.'

'Right.' Cordelia was worried now, maybe Doyle was right - Angel had an insanely good memory, he didn't forget things - ever. It was one of his most irritating traits, and Lord could Cordelia list all of Angel's irritating traits.

Marcus reached out for the case file in her hand, but Cordelia put it behind her back, 'not until you've spoken to Fred,' she said, 'I - uh - I just wanna go talk to Doyle about… something - not you,' she beamed at him and began to back away. As she did, she bumped into Wesley, appearing at his door with a large flowery teapot in his hand. 'Sorry,' she said, and then gave the teapot a look.

'There's just something about brewed tea that you simply cannot replicate with a bag,' the watcher told her, 'I woke up this morning with a craving. Ask Doyle if he wants some.'

'He's a coffee drinker,' Cordelia said.

Wesley gave her a look. 'The Irish drink more tea per capita than the British do, Cordelia. Just because he has turned to coffee, as he is exiled on a barren continent that doesn't know how to make tea correctly, doesn't mean that he won't jump at the chance to have a proper cup of the good stuff - ask him.'

'Jeez - alright, I'll ask him,' she looked back at Marcus, 'don't avoid the talk.'

'I know, I know.'

Wesley set his teapot down, and looked at the mess of papers on his desk. Marcus watched him, 'how are you doing?'

The British man looked up at him, 'alright. Well - you?'

'So - we gotta talk,' Marcus pulled a chair up and sat down, 'the thing is - I've got nothing against you personally, it's just…' Wesley continued to stare at him, a frown beginning to play on his face. Marcus sighed, 'oho - this is gonna be tougher than I thought. I just don't know how to spit this out.'

Wesley perched on the edge of the desk, balancing, and reached a hand out to the other man, 'Angel, whatever it is, you know I'm here for you.'

Marcus scooted his chair backwards. 'Yeah. That may be the problem.' He gave an uncomfortable chuckle. 'Look - whatever we - had… whatever we - did. I just think we should keep that - behind us - start from scratch. You know, two men, working side by side - but none of that funny stuff.'

Wesley stood back up, still frowning. He was utterly bemused. But the man in front of him got to his feet and held out his hand. 'Shake on that?' Marcus asked.

The watcher stared at his hand for a moment, utterly baffled and bemused. 'I guess,' he said, after a beat, and shook hands.

Marcus pulled him into a hug. 'Hey, all right - gimme a hug.'

Doyle then wandered into this world of befuddlement and confusion, 'Wesley?' his voice was hopeful, 'Cordelia said somethin' about a real cup o' tea?…. But I see you guys are in the middle of some kinda man hug - uh - what's goin' on?'

Marcus dropped Wesley from his embrace and then turned to look between the two men. 'Wesley?'

'Yes?'

'Angel - get outta here, I want some tea - _doll_.' Cordelia had told her boyfriend about the weirdness she had found in Wes' office, and the Irishman was still trying to work through it. And he was none too happy about Angel starting to use pet names on Cordelia - that was strictly Doyle's territory and it always had been, even before he'd had any hope of dating her. He ushered the vampire out of the room, and took a cup from Wesley. He took a sip and then wrinkled his nose in disappointment, 'see, y' can get the brew just right - and everythin' - but the milk here just isn't right. And until they fix that ...I mean what the hell is "half and half" when it's a home?'

'It's their word for semi skimmed.'

'Well it's disgustin'. That's not what semi skimmed is meant to taste like.' He took another sip. 'In other news - Angel's gone crazy… or maybe he's possessed. And then there's always "evil" as a possible outlier.'

'Oh - is that what all that hugging and "let's be friends" stuff was about?'

Doyle nodded. The two men both drank their tea in silence, reflecting on Angel's weird behaviour.

* * *

Out in the lobby, Marcus met Cordelia behind the counter. Gunn was standing at the other side; paper bags, with today's breakfast, sat on the desk. 'Tell the others the food is here, would you?' Cordelia said to Marcus.

'Food? I'll tell them in a minute - I could eat a horse.' He took out some money and stuffed it into Gunn's shirt pocket, before grabbing a burrito. 'Thanks,' he said, 'keep the change.'

Gunn glanced down at the bills sticking out of his shirt, 'uh - thanks.'

'So did you find anything out last night?' Cordelia asked the street fighter, 'it was a total bust our end, you're pretty much our only hope.'

Marcus eyed up the other man as he chewed his burrito.

'Yeah - I got something. Where are the others?'

'Enjoying a fresh cup of tea,' she snorted, 'they're such Eurotrash!'

Gunn sniggered. Marcus swallowed. Hard. He realised that the man he had mistaken for a delivery boy was part of the team. _This_ was Fred? Man! The talk with the effete Brit with the teapot had been bad enough, he didn't think he could make it through a breakup talk with this massive slab of glowering muscle… though when Angel's body ran out, maybe he would would take this other one for a spin. He took another bite of his burrito.

Cordelia frowned at him, 'why are you eating?'

'I'm hungry,' Marcus replied.

The woman shook her head, 'he's been totally weird all morning,' she said to the other man - before she walked over to Wes' office door and pushed it open, 'Gunn's here with the breakfast - said he found something out at the hotel last night,' she said to the men inside.

Marcus sighed with relief - so this tall stranger wasn't Fred after all - he was the other name from the business cards. He should have guessed that. 'Hey, Gunn?' he said, 'you got any idea where Fred's at today?' He couldn't keep second guessing every man he bumped into.

Gunn shrugged, 'Probably up in her room, why?'

' _Her_ room - Fred's a girl - right.'

'And again with the weird,' the street fighter looked up, as they were joined by the others. 'So, I spoke to the staff at the hotels,' he said, 'All these guys ran up huge service bills, mostly alcohol - at least they went out partying - and I got hold of their phone calls. They all called the same number.' He handed the printouts to Wesley, who began to scan them.

'Hey, isn't this illegal?' Marcus asked, biting into his burrito again, 'don't they deserve a little privacy?'

They all stared at him. 'You're a _detective_ ,' Cordelia said her voice laden with irony, 'these are called _clues_ \- we use them to help us solve a case.'

Doyle began to root through the paper bag Gunn had brought, 'hey - how come there isn't a burrito for me?' he asked.

'That would be because the _great detective_ , over there, is eating it,' Cordelia told him. She broke off a chunk of her own and handed it to her boyfriend.

Doyle looked at Angel, his expression somewhere between bewildered and hurt, 'you ate my burrito? Why'd you do that, man?'

'I was hungry!' Marcus said, 'I didn't know Gunn hadn't bought enough for everyone.' The whole team stared at him again, 'what?' he asked again. There was something very weird about this little detective agency, he thought.

Wesley shook his head, 'so this number -' he indicated the phone log, 'do we know what it is?'

' _We_ do,' Gunn replied, 'I already checked it out. First class escorts La Brea and sixth.'

'Oh - man,' Doyle sounded disgusted, 'these guys had it coming to them.'

'La Brea, huh?' Cordelia mused, 'that's where that club is - you know the one I went to with the guy that knocked me up with the spawn of the Haxil beast?'

'Oh yeah - I remember that,' Doyle's expression took on a reminiscent air, 'I saved you.'

'Wes and Angel _saved_ me,' she elbowed him, 'I only went on that date in the first place because you wouldn't ask me out. If anything, it was all your fault! So these guys were all ringing up round La Brea for escorts?' She sounded confused, but then her eyebrows shot to the top of her forehead as she realised, 'oh, you mean hookers?' Doyle nodded.

Gunn reached out and took the paper back from Wesley, 'so I figured I should go down there and interview them - you know, whilst the trail is still hot.'

Wesley took the paper back, 'I'll take this one,' he said, 'You interviewed the hotel staff. It's only fair if we divvy it up.'

Gunn snatched the paper back off him, 'yeah, but I figured it out.'

Cordelia snatched the paper off Gunn, 'me and Doyle will go and interview them,' she said, 'you guys are just too … _gross_.'

'You're gonna take Irish down to a brothel?' Gunn protested, 'how is that fair? He's got you _and_ he gets to spend the day chatting up the fine senoritas down at La Brea.'

'It's fair because he's the only one of you I can trust to actually do some work down there … and how bad is that? That _Doyle_ is the person I trust to do _work_? Those words, like, shouldn't even belong in the same sentence. You guys should be ashamed.'

Wesley's beeper went off and he checked it. 'That's my contact from the coroner's office - I can see one of the bodies. I should go.'

'Gunn can go with you,' Cordelia said.

'That wasn't the kind of body I had in mind to see.' Both Cordelia and Doyle gave him a look, and the street fighter put his hands up in surrender, 'we're going, we're going.' The two men walked to the door and - after getting her purse - the young couple followed them out.

Marcus watched them go. 'That's a great idea,' he yelled after them, 'I'll just stay here and … guard the evidence.' He crammed the last of the burrito in his mouth - he wasn't any less hungry than he had been before.

* * *

Angel sat out in the reception area of the Monserrat retirement home. He had a book open on his lap, but he wasn't reading - he was watching the front desk, and waiting for the security guard to leave. An elderly woman arrived at the door, pushing her walker in front of her. The guard got up and went over to help, holding the door and then taking her across to the elevators. Angel seized his chance. He pushed himself up from the sofa, feeling his bones and joints complain as he did, and began to hurry for the front door.

His way was blocked by another elderly man. 'Marcus there's someone I want you to meet,' he said.

Angel glanced between the clear front door, and the elevator where the guard was helping the woman inside. 'I can't right now,' he tried to say.

But the other elderly man turned to the young woman behind him, and took her baby from her arms. 'This is my baby granddaughter, Katrina,' the man said, placing the tiny baby in Angel's arms. 'Girl's gonna rule the world. Isn't she something?'

Angel looked down into the scrunched up, sleeping face of the tiny girl, and began to smile. 'She's beautiful.' He looked up again, and saw that the guard had returned to his desk.

* * *

Marcus switched on the shredder and fed through all the newspaper clippings about the dead bodies. When that was done, he sat down, put his feet up on Wesley's desk and took a sip of a martini.

'What are you doing?'

There was a woman stood in the doorway. She was small, and thin - but she had long, pretty hair and big brown eyes. Well, she was better than nothing. 'Hey, sweetheart, where've you been hiding?' he asked her.

'Oh, up in my room,' she smiled a self - deprecating smile, 'everyone's always saying "Fred you need to get out more" so, well…'

So this was the long awaited Fred? And despite not being able to get with Cordelia - and losing her to the shortest man on the team, no less - the giant schmuck whose body he was wearing wasn't even apparently able to close the deal with _this_ doe eyed wallflower? Youth was wasted on the young! But Marcus wasn't going to waste another minute. He took another sip of his martini and then got to his feet and walked around the desk so he was closer to Fred. 'Have I ever told you that you are a _very_ beautiful woman?' he asked her.

She blushed bright red, looked down at her feet and beamed a big, goofy grin. 'Umm - no?'

'Do you like olives?' he slipped the olive from his martini off its cocktail stick and fed it to her. 'Tell you what,' he said, 'I've got some work to finish up here. Why don't you go upstairs and put on something pretty and then we'll go out on the town?'

'Really?'

He tapped her nose with the cocktail stick, 'and that's just for starters.'

Impossible as it might have seemed, her smile grew even broader and she blushed an even deeper pink. 'Oh - uh - OK I'll just go and - OK,' and she turned and scuttled out of the room. Marcus watched her go, and then went back to shredding files.

...

Lilah walked into the office, and Marcus turned the shredder off and looked her up and down, 'and what can I do for you?' he asked her.

'Don't go all night stalker on me, I'm here to do you a favour. We both agree that my problem with Doyle can't get in the way of our relationship - and that business with him the other week was just business, right?'

'Sure.'

The lawyer reached into her briefcase and took out a bundle of papers and dropped them on Wesley's desk. 'It's all in there,' she said to the man in front of her, 'earthquake safe certification, asbestos level compliance - all of it.'

Marcus glanced at the bundle of papers, and then picked up his martini glass.

'This isn't about playing you,' Lilah told him, 'it's not about you. It's about _Gavin_. He thinks he's so smart.' Marcus was pouring out two martini's. 'You're welcome,' she said to him - a note of irritation creeping into her voice.

'I'm sorry - thanks,' he dropped an olive into each glass, 'that was a really - thoughtful favour. How about a drink?' he handed her one of the martini glasses. 'Have I ever told you you are a _very_ beautiful woman?'

Lilah stared at him, he clinked his glass against her own and he began to drink.

* * *

Angel left his room and shuffled down the hall to see if the guard was gone yet. Nope. He was still sat out front. Seeing the fire alarm in front of him, Angel made his decision. He smashed the glass and pressed the alarm, and watched as the guard left the desk to go and find the source of the fire. He began to hurry towards the door, as fast as he could but, halfway to freedom, he felt sudden shooting pains in his left arm. And then his chest went tight. 'My..my heart,' he gasped, and he collapsed to the floor.

* * *

Lilah set her empty glass down on the desk. 'Want another?' Marcus asked her.

'I'll already have to call a taxi as it is,' she replied. She got out of her chair and turned to leave - but Marcus stretched his leg out to bar her way. She stopped as she came to it and looked back at him.

'Oops,' he said.

'What do you want?' That note of irritation was creeping back into her voice.

Marcus stepped up to her, and brushed her hair away from her face. 'Don't tell me you never thought about it,' he whispered. He leaned in close and the began to kiss her. She pulled away from him, but he grabbed her and kissed her again. And this time she returned it. The kiss became hotter and heavier. Lilah ripped the man's shirt open, revealing Angel's gleaming muscular chest. Marcus swept the papers from the desk and pushed her down, climbing on top of her as he continued to kiss her.

...

Fred walked through the door. She had put on a dark red dress and wore her hair down, flowing around her shoulders. She was smiling, a hopeful, excited smile. But then she stopped dead, when she saw the two people groping on the desk. She turned and ran away - Marcus and Lilah never realised she had been there.

...

Marcus kissed Lilah on the mouth, and then moved along to her jaw, and then down her neck. He nuzzled deep into her neck, feeling her warmth and smelling the scent of her perfume. Then his face vamped out, and he bit down. Lilah screamed...


	15. Carpe Noctem: Part Three

Huddled in the elevator, Fred heard the sound of a woman scream out. She wrapped her arms around her knees and buried her face in them, and began to cry. It didn't mean anything, she thought to herself, the handsome man could have any woman he wanted - and he would be nice to them all in order to get it - it didn't mean you were special because he paid attention to you, or held doors open, or bought you popcorn. It hadn't meant anything. She was just a silly girl who had forgotten the way the world worked. Living in a world of monsters, and then being rescued by a noble champion and being taken away to his castle - well, hotel - she had begun to believe too literally in fairy tales. But you couldn't have the fairy tale. It didn't mean anything. She wasn't special. She should have remembered that. But she still hadn't expected her saviour to be so cruel…

* * *

Wesley grimaced, as he inspected the puddle of skin that his coroner contact had just pulled out of the freezer. 'Man,' Gunn was looking away, 'this is nasty - this used to be a real guy?'

'It really does look like his insides just … melted away…' Wesley wrinkled his nose and then spoke to his contact, 'what did the autopsy find?'

'Nothing much _to_ find,' the coroner replied. 'We usually take out their organs - weigh them - run tests for drugs, inspect them for damage and so on - but…'

'There were no organs to inspect?' Gunn asked, the coroner nodded his agreement. 'It's the darndest thing - third in a month, and no explanation. The man's medical records say he was healthy before - this - but that's all we have to go on because there's so little left to look at.'

Wesley stared down at the body - it looked like nothing so much as an empty rubber glove. He wrinkled his nose, again. 'This man and the others frequented the same gym,' he told the coroner, 'any traces of steroids in any of them?'

But the coroner shook his head, 'anyways,' he said, 'steroids can have a lot of nasty side effects - and can lead to an early death due to heart attack but … they could never lead to this.'

'Unless the steroids had been tampered with - then some pretty funky stuff can happen,' Gunn said. He was thinking about the story Cordelia had once told him about the high school swim team being exposed to contaminated steroids and all turning into fish monsters. They had left a puddle of skin behind, as well - or so she said. But if there was no trace of drugs in these men - then that couldn't be it.

'Well - you guys are the experts in the world of weird,' the coroner was saying, 'and I defer to you on knowledge of what freaky things can happen to a person… but in this case - masses of alcohol consumed, but no drugs. And the alcohol hadn't been tampered with, no roofies, no speed, no unidentifiable enzymes - nothing. Sorry I can't be of any more help.'

'No, no,' Wesley assured him, 'being able to eliminate possibilities is a help. We know that whatever is causing this isn't chemical - so we know to explore other avenues now. Thank you for your time.' The coroner slid the gurney with the pile of skin on back into the freezer and the two team members left.

'OK - not chemical,' Gunn said, 'we know to explore other avenues… so what other avenues are we gonna explore?'

'I suppose we must assume it is mystical in nature. I'll hit my books. Maybe Doyle can get on the demon database - see if there are any demons that might cause this - old fashioned research is what is needed now.'

Gunn groaned.

* * *

'Uhuh, so he just melted into a pile of skin on the floor? Did you see anything else - like oh say - a big, scaly monster?'

'What?' The escort that Cordelia was interviewing, down on La Brea, looked confused.

Doyle chuckled. 'I think what Cordelia is tryin' to say…' he gave his girlfriend a pointed look, 'is - puddle o' skin aside, did you see anythin' else unusual? Was there anybody there after Woody collapsed - or was it just his... leftovers?'

'It was just me and Aleesha,' the escort said. 'We were on the bed - he'd paid us for the whole night, but he was insatiable, y'know?'

'Stamina - yeah - I get it,' Doyle said, sounding wistful.

Cordelia swatted him on the chest with the back of her hand. 'Oh, please!' she said to him, and then spoke to the other woman, 'so you and Aleesha were on the bed? And then it's all… who's on the floor?'

'Yeah, he went to get a drink - because we were both too tired to... you know…' she pulled a face to convey her meaning, and the young couple both nodded. Too tired to … you know... - they both got that. But, sadly, mostly from excessive monster hunting and not from excessive … _you know_.

'Did he drink the drink?' Doyle asked, 'had he been drinking before or…?'

'Yeah - we'd all had champagne.'

'All from the same bottle?'

The escort nodded her head.

'If they all drank from the same bottle, it couldn't have been something in the champagne that made him go all insideless,' Cordelia said to her boyfriend, 'Otherwise Brandy and Aleesha would be rocking the little pile o' skin look as well.'

' _What?'_ Brandy sounded horrified.

'So it's nothin' he drank…' Doyle surmised, 'and I guess Wes and Gunn will be able to tell us whether it was something he took, after they've spoken to the coroner.' He looked at Brandy, 'did you see him take anythin' - other than the booze - any pills? Coke? Anythin'?' But the escort shook her head. Doyle thought some more. 'Well, did he say anythin' - before he collapsed?'

This time, Brandy nodded her head. 'He started saying something - like - chanting - in another language.'

'Did you know which one?' But she answered in the negative.

Doyle and Cordy looked at each other, 'getting chanty in foreign tongues means mystical,' Cordelia said, 'like he did this to himself on purpose - or something was controlling him or...'

'I think we can rule out him doin' this to himself on purpose,' Doyle interrupted. 'Was there anythin' else at all, that you can think of? No matter how small it might seem?' He asked Brandy. She shook her head, but then paused and looked uncertain. 'Well - maybe something.'

'What was it?'

'Just before he… he said something to himself, I only just caught it.'

'What did he say?' Doyle asked.

'He said - 'it's good to be young' - I mean, that's weird isn't it? Woody was a young guy…'

* * *

'You son of a bitch,' Lilah pushed the vampire off of her, her face furious. She pulled a cross out and thrust it into the vampire's face. 'I don't know what kind of sick game you're playing, Angel, but I hope you enjoyed it because you're never getting this close again.'

Marcus held his hands up, 'whoa - I'm sorry - it just seemed like the thing to do,' he squinted at the cross, 'what are you, born again all of a sudden?' He made to move towards her, she brandished the cross right into his face and he found himself cringing away from it. The lawyer stormed out of the room and Marcus lifted his hand to run through his hair - it was cool - just a set back - there'd be others - so this broad turned out to be nuts, it didn't mean anything. It wasn't a reflection on him.

But, as he touched his head, he felt the thickened brow - hanging low over his eyes. 'What? This is new.' He began to touch his face with the tips of his fingers, feeling how the shape of it had changed. As he brought his hands down to his jawline, he felt his teeth - sharp and jagged like fangs, and pricked his thumb. It began to bleed, the red standing out on his skin like a ruby. It looked oddly appetising - but it was also painful. He stuck his thumb into his mouth to try and stem the flow and then immediately removed it - looking down in surprise. That was delicious. He stuck his thumb back in his mouth and sucked harder. This was way better than the breakfast burrito had been. Much more flavoursome.

Wondering about the new shape of his face, and still sucking his bleeding thumb - he wandered into the bathroom. The medicine cabinet was open, and he shut it so he could look into the mirror, on the door. The bathroom reflected back at him - but he wasn't there. He was looking at an empty room. 'What the….?'

* * *

Angel lay in the hospital bed, staring up at the heart monitor - watching each miraculous heartbeat. He didn't know how long he had lain there - just looking at it - the green line jumping up and down in steady rhythm. He didn't think he'd ever get bored of watching it. And better than just the lines on the monitor - with every beep from the machine, he felt the corresponding thump in his chest… in Marcus' chest. He wondered if the real Marcus had even noticed that his own heart beat was missing in his new body.

'You're awake.'

Angel tore his gaze away from the monitor and looked towards the voice - it was Ryan, stood beside the bed, looking down at him. 'It's beating,' Angel said, looking back towards the monitor. He brought his hand up over his chest, and gently tapped along in time.

'This was your fourth heart attack, Marcus,' Ryan said to him. 'I don't know if you can survive another. You got lucky this time. But try something like that again - you may not be.'

* * *

Doyle and Cordelia arrived back at the Hyperion. It was dark now, and the moon was big and round in the sky. They lingered out in the courtyard, enjoying the night air, and the scent of the jasmine - not really wanting to go back inside the hotel and start dealing with mystical chantings and collapsing insides. 'You know, this case can wait 'til morning. Maybe we could just go home instead?' Cordelia suggested, as she kissed her boyfriend, 'or we could go out - to dinner - or to the movies.'

'Not to see Soylent Green, though, right?'

She began to laugh. 'No - God - Angel is such a dork! We could go and see a good movie - something new.'

'There's a new "Planet of the Apes" - stickin' with the Charlton Heston theme.'

'Mmm - let me think - _no_. I don't like movies about monkeys.'

'Marky Mark's in it.'

'Is that meant to make me want to see it less or more? Anyway … maybe it's too nice an evening to go and sit in a dark movie theatre… we could drive out to the beach,' she kissed him again, 'go skinny dipping.'

'I'm listenin'...'

'Yeah, we could just - _borrow_ \- Angel's car, drive up to El Matador, find ourselves a. nice. secluded. cove.' She punctuated each word with another kiss, 'and then…' she arched an eyebrow, ' … think about it, beautiful moonlight, the waves crashing around us…'

'You know, I hear the water there is pretty clear...'

'Even better - it's always more fun when we can see what we're doing. You can show off some of that stamina you were bragging about to that escort.'

'Your wish is my command, Princess,' he took her hand and began to pull her towards the glass door, 'I'll just sneak in and grab Angel's keys. You stay on look out - we don't wanna get trapped by Wes tellin' us stuff about... well, y'know, let's not even think about it.' They crept inside, on tiptoe, alert for any sound. 'Tell me again about the moon and the waves,' Doyle hissed - wanting to get his mind back on their planned evening of romance, after inadvertently distracting himself with thoughts of Wesley.

'Mmm - it'll be so good - the moonlight dancing on the water. And we'll be able to taste the salt on each other's skin and… do you hear that?' She paused and looked around.

'Is it the sound of the ocean lapping up against our naked bodies? - 'cause if it is then, yeah - the sea is callin' to me.'

'No - shhh,' she listened harder, 'it sounds like someone crying.' She took her purse off from around her shoulders and dumped it on the counter.

Doyle watched her, 'Cordy - we could just…'

'Shh,' she walked further into the lobby. Doyle looked after her, and then glanced back at the doorway. He could see his evening of ocean based romance sliding out of view. He sighed, there was always something. Well, fine, but this was only a rain check - now Cordelia had suggested the possibility of moonlight skinny dipping together, he found that there was nothing more in the world that he wanted. As a general rule, the half demon was massively against any and all forms of public nudity - and he still suffered from his recurring nightmares about being naked in the freezer section of the grocery store - but in these particular circumstances he was willing to waive his reservations. He wanted to go skinny dipping with Cordelia - and he fully intended to achieve his dream before he was very much older - before the end of the week, if he could swing it... He just hoped the ocean wouldn't be too cold.

Locating where the sound of the crying was coming from, Cordelia pushed open the elevator door - and found Fred huddled in the corner, her face streaked with tears. She glanced back at her boyfriend in alarm, and then crouched down beside the distraught woman. 'Fred? What's wrong? What happened?'

'I should've knocked,' Fred gasped. Doyle frowned and headed towards the elevator, so he could listen better. 'I always forget to knock,' Fred was telling Cordelia, 'because I didn't have a door for so long.' Cordelia made soothing noises, and Fred looked up at her - trying to choke back her sobs. 'He called me sweetheart,' she said, 'but it's just an expression isn't it? Like when a waitress calls you honey. It doesn't mean you're special or anything. It's just a word, isn't it? Sweetheart. It's not like when _he_ calls you princess. He never calls anyone else princess - just you - because you're special to him.'

The couple looked at each other again.

'But I should've known,' Fred continued, her lip still trembling. 'It's just - he never called me that before. And I thought… I should've knocked…'

'Is this about Angel?' Cordelia asked, Fred nodded. 'Oh - he talked to you - didn't he?' Fred nodded, again.

Doyle approached the two women, softly, and crouched down at Fred's other side. His brow was wrinkled in confusion. 'What did he say to y'?' he asked - he couldn't work out why Angel would call Fred "sweetheart" - especially not when he was trying to gently explain to her that there could never be anything but friendship between them. Angel never used pet names - pet names for women were Doyle's thing. But then… he remembered Cordelia reporting that the vampire had called her "doll" just that morning. Were terms of endearment just something new that Angel was trying out? If so it was a pretty insensitive time to start using them. Or was something more sinister going on?

Cordelia, however, was too busy feeling major guilt to notice anything amiss in Fred's story. 'What does it matter what he said?' she snapped at her boyfriend, 'he loused it up, whatever, oh I knew he would do something like this.' She turned back to the other woman and her voice became softer. 'Oh Fred, I'm sorry, this is all my fault. I told him to do this.'

Fred stared at her, her expression confused. 'You told him to make out with that woman on the desk?'

' _What?_ No! What woman?'

* * *

Marcus walked inside the nightclub. The music was loud, and strobe lights flashed in time to the beat, the whole place was packed with young people - having fun, sure, but they didn't really appreciate what they had right here. There was no way they were making the most of this. He stood by the crowded bar, and surveyed the room. Over near the dance floor, there was a very pretty young woman sat at a table with her boyfriend. She would do.

Her eyes scanned around the room and, as her gaze fell over the bar, she found herself locked in eye contact with a tall, ridiculously handsome man that stood there. Marcus stared straight back at her for a moment, and a brief smile played across her lips, before she broke contact and turned back to her boyfriend. She said something to the man beside her; and Marcus watched as the boyfriend got to his feet, picked up the empty glasses from the table, and walked off. The woman looked back at him and smiled, invitingly.

It was a shame Cordelia wasn't more like this woman, Marcus thought to himself. A bit less loyalty to the leprechaun with the extreme chest hair, and the young office manager could have found herself having a really wild time with a man who knew how to live for every moment. But still - this other woman would do - for now. He smiled at her, across the club, and she smiled back.

A crowd of people jostled past the bar, and once her view was clear again, the woman was disappointed to see that the handsome man had vanished. The smile slid from her face. But then a martini glass was placed down on the table in front of her - and she turned around and saw Marcus standing beside her. She moved over, slightly, to allow him to sit next to her. As he sat down, he slid his hand along her thigh - and then whispered something into her ear.

* * *

Cordelia had managed to convince Fred to leave the elevator. Doyle had scuttled off to make her some coffee - the young woman still didn't seem to like him very much, he wasn't sure why - he assumed she'd just taken against his face, people often did - and he didn't want to get in her way whilst she was so visibly distressed.

The two women were sitting on the sofa, and Cordy was trying to draw out all the pertinent details - trying to create a timeline of events that would make sense. 'So you came downstairs and he was alone?' she checked. Fred nodded. 'And he was what - brooding? Reading? I'd say 'working' - but there's little chance of _that!_ '

'He was drinking,' Fred gasped out.

'So he was having a mug of pigs blood? OK so far so normal.'

But Fred shook her head, 'no - he had a martini - he fed me the olive,' she began to cry again.

Cordelia froze. 'He did _what_?'

Doyle arrived, carrying the coffees - he handed one to Fred. 'here you go, drink up, love.' He had made it Irish, to try and soothe her - she didn't even seem to notice.

'Doyle, Fred says Angel was drinking a martini… in the middle of the day. Have you ever seen Angel drink a martini?'

'Ummm - nope. He's strictly a pig's blood, coffee, and scotch man. And one time we did tequila slammers, but we were in Mexico at the time, so it was a cultural experience.'

'Uhuh, "culture" - sure...And he's been doing stuff out of character for a while now, hasn't he?'

'Yeah - he has been off, kinda irritating - even by his standards.'

Cordelia turned back to Fred. 'Martinis aside - what happened - what was going on?'

The other woman seemed to have calmed down, as the whisky in her coffee began to take effect. 'He had the shredder on. I remember because I heard the noise from the top of the stairs and wondered what it was.'

'I think maybe we should go look into what Mr. out of Character has been getting rid of,' Doyle said. And the three of them made their way over to the office, just as Wesley as Gunn arrived through the front door.

* * *

Marcus pulled the woman outside, onto the balcony. They could still hear the music from inside - but it was more private out here.

Inside, the boyfriend and his friends arrived back at the table. He frowned when he found his girlfriend gone.

The girl was laughing, as she kissed Marcus. 'My boyfriend's probably looking for me, he could catch us at any moment,' she murmured, she pressed her lips against his own and kissed him hard. Marcus broke the kiss, and then began to work his way downwards, nuzzling into her neck. She arched her neck back, so he could get at it better, and smiled - her hands moving over his body the whole time. 'It makes all this more exciting, doesn't it?' she said.

'Yeah,' Marcus pulled away from her - his face vamped out, 'it does.' The woman screamed when she saw the man's handsome face turned monstrous. He leaned in and bit down, feeling the warmth of her blood course into his mouth.

The boyfriend and his friends walked out onto the balcony - and saw the girl in the embrace of another man. 'What's going on?'

Marcus dropped the woman, and she staggered back, clutching her bleeding neck. 'He bit me!' she cried.

Her boyfriend saw the redness seeping between her fingers, and turned to look at Marcus, his face screwed up in disgust. 'What kind of freak are you?' He hauled back to hit the man who had bit his girlfriend. But Marcus caught his fist and clamped down. The guy began to groan as he felt his hand getting crushed. The vampire swung with his other hand, hitting the boyfriend in the face. The man flew backwards and landed in a crumpled heap on the floor.

Marcus stared at his own fist in delighted surprise - this strength was beyond anything the gym bunnies had had - it was superhuman. 'Nice!'

The other men came at him, but they were no match for him. He grabbed the first, headbutted him and then tossed him aside. Like the boyfriend, this man flew much further back than Marcus had intended. Then he walked straight into the fist of the next guy, before punching him and sending him flying. He turned back to the boyfriend. 'Come on! Bring it on! Is that it? Is that all you got?'

The boyfriend, still down on the floor, began to scoot backwards to get away from him, staring up at him in horror. 'What are you on?'

Marcus grinned. 'Well I'd say I'm high on life but - I aint alive - which means I'll never die. I'll be young and handsome and strong - forever. There's just one thing I've gotta do first.' He ran to edge of the balcony and vaulted over, landing on his feet in the street below. The group of people went to the edge to look over - it was a drop of several storeys - but the man who had attacked them was clearly visible, running down the street. He was laughing.

* * *

'On my desk?' Wesley sounded horrified. 'I don't believe it. My desk?'

'Well, it did used to be his,' Gunn pointed out, 'maybe he's just, you know - reclaiming it.'

Wesley managed to look even more horrified, 'how? By marking it? This isn't like him.'

'He's been acting out of character for a while though, bud - we've all noticed.' Doyle was rooting through the trash can beneath the shredder, trying to find what it was that Angel had destroyed that afternoon.

'I don't know,' Cordelia replied, 'the breakfast burrito - the martini - that's out of character. Doing the mystery dance with some cheap blonde? That's totally like him.'

'Brunette,' Fred sniffed, 'she was a cheap brunette.'

The rest if the team froze and then stared at each other. 'You're right,' Cordelia said, 'this _isn't_ like him.'

'Hey, I think I've found something!' Doyle began to pull bits of shredded paper out of the trash and then pieced them together on the desk - like a jigsaw puzzle. 'Isn't this the newspaper clippin's from the case file?'

'So Angel destroyed evidence and then did the nasty on Wes' desk with some dark haired babe?' Gunn asked, 'who was she?'

But Wesley frowned as he looked at the clippings, 'I don't think it matters who she was - the question is "who is he"?'

'Aww man - I said it this morning - crazy, possessed or evil. So which is it?' Doyle looked at his boss expectantly.

'Sex on a desk? We're all thinking it,' Cordelia said, 'he's Angelus again.'

'Who's Angelus?' Fred was confused.

It was Gunn that explained it to her. 'The bad ass vamp that Angel turns into when he goes evil.'

'So do we get the tranq gun and ring Cordelia's witch friend?' Doyle asked.

But Wesley shook his head, He didn't think Angelus was the culprit, at all. 'Yeah,' agreed Gunn, 'there's no body - why wouldn't he just kill her?'

'Exactly,' Wesley picked up one of the books that lay open on the desk and held it out to the others. 'And why would Angel - or Angelus for that matter - need to read about vampires?' He looked at his team, 'this case we've been working on - each victim displayed out of character behaviour before they died.'

Doyle whistled. Gunn nodded along, cottoning on. 'So you think he's been infected by whatever got those gym guys?'

'Not whatever - whomever … and he's been destroying the evidence we were gathering on him,' the watcher turned to Doyle and Cordy, 'did anything happen whilst you were at that gym?'

Cordelia shrugged, 'nothing - the guys didn't stay very long. They went over to the … to the old folks home.' She looked at her boyfriend, 'and he's been acting weird since he came out - what happened?'

Doyle scrunched his face up, as he tried to remember when Angel had started behaving strangely. 'Well… there was one guy - he wouldn't talk to me. Angel said he would speak with him and I went off to go interview someone else. The next thing I know - I look out the window and Angel's back in the car with his arm around Cordy.'

'It's good to be young,' Cordelia said, as realisation dawned.

* * *

Angel snuck down the hallway of the Monserrat retirement community. He came out to the lobby - it looked deserted, he stuck his hands in his pockets and began to walk through - trying to look casual. 'Hey!' a voice made him jump. It was the old man who had introduced Angel to his new born granddaughter. 'What the hell are you doing out of bed?' the old man demanded, 'You're trying to bust loose again aint you? Damn Marcus, you just don't quit. Do you want to have another heart attack?'

'Look - I can't explain this, but I need to get out of here,' Angel put his hand on the old man's shoulder, 'just don't turn me in?'

But the man smiled. 'I don't need to. Your kid was signing in at reception when I came down.'

Angel was nonplussed. 'My kid?'

'Mmhmm,' the man walked away - and Angel turned to look at the reception desk.

He saw himself, standing there - plain as day. His own body, stood by the desk. Marcus grinned at him, and Angel began to back away. 'Hi dad,' he heard his own voice say.


	16. Carpe Noctem: Part Four

'So - This guy, wearing Angel's body, makes out with some mystery chick and then… where is he now?' Gunn asked. They had all relocated back out to the lobby and were sitting on the sofas. 'He's not here anymore - where did he go?'

'And more to the point,' Doyle added, 'do we go lookin' for him, or do we hurry on down to the old folks home and get the real Angel?… This guy could be anywhere, how are we gonna track him?' Cordelia opened her mouth to start to speak, but her boyfriend cut her off, 'and don't tell me we're detectives, Princess, and that trackin' people is what we do. We suck at it and we all know it.' Cordelia closed her mouth again, and looked put out.

But Wesley had an idea. 'I'm not sure we need to decide whether to find the real Angel or the man who has stolen his body - I rather wonder if they won't be together.'

'How d'y' figure?'

'We know this person has discovered Angel's vampiric nature - probably whilst with the mystery woman, he probably bit her without understanding why.'

Fred nodded at that, 'I did hear the cheap brunette scream, some. I just thought...'

'Precisely,' Wesley nodded, 'Now, the human bodies he has been stealing have only had a certain… shelf life. After a few hours the energy burns them up and his essence has to return to his own, frail, ageing body.'

'Leaving behind an icky collapsed sack of skin,' Cordelia said, wrinkling her nose. She suddenly looked alarmed. 'But it's been nearly a full day - is Angel's body gonna deflate like a wrinkly, old balloon?'

'I rather think not,' Wesley told her, 'his body is somewhat stronger than a human's - the energy won't burn him out. This old man that Doyle met has finally found himself a body that he can keep forever.'

'Providin' he knows enough about vampires not to walk our boy outside durin' the daytime,' Doyle pointed out. 'Plus all the creatures that go bump in the night that want to kill Angel … he might have a harder time than he's imaginin', keepin' himself alive.'

'But at least we got time,' Gunn said, 'everyone knows about vamps and sunlight. I say we go get Angel - worry about this guy later.'

'No,' Wesley said, 'having found a body he can keep forever - this man will want to ensure that he isn't forced out of it and back into his own - and there's only one way he can do that. He needs to get rid of Angel.'

'Get rid?' Cordelia wrinkled her nose up in confusion, and then her expression cleared, 'oh, you mean kill.' Then she looked alarmed. 'Oh - you mean _kill!_ So they're both at the old folks home then - what are we waiting for?' There was a sudden flurry of activity as they all scrambled for weapons and then ran out of the door.

* * *

Angel began to back away. Over by the desk, Marcus grinned and then began to saunter after him; prowling like a tiger hunting its prey. Angel had managed to slip away - so Marcus could no longer see him but, in this new body, he didn't have to. Vampire senses were a remarkable thing. He sniffed the air, and smirked to himself - he turned and entered the rec room. The room was in darkness, but again, this was no problem for Marcus with his new vampire senses. His eyes were made to see in the dark - he was a creature of the night, a nocturnal predator, after all.

Angel hid behind the door. He was no match for his own body - not in this weak and ailing shell. He only had the element of surprise on his side. He held the only weapon he could find - the cue from the shuffleboard - over his head and, as Marcus stepped into the room, brought it crashing down onto the other man's head. Marcus was thrown off balance, but the force Angel had been able to put behind the hit was nowhere near enough to harm a vampire. He turned and, as Angel swung again, caught the staff and pulled it from his hands. Angel staggered backwards.

'So I guess you finally found a body that won't burn out, huh, Marcus?' he asked.

'Looks like.'

'But there's only one way you can keep it though, isn't there?' he thumped his fist over his beating heart, 'you have to kill yourself.'

Marcus copied the gesture, thumping himself over the still and lifeless heart that lay in his chest. 'I can live with that,' he grinned.

'You sure?' Angel asked 'I don't think you really know what you're getting into.' To never see the sun; to never just walk down the street in the day time, to never truly be a part of the world. And then there was the bloodlust. Marcus couldn't know the ravening hunger of being a predator, and how it changed everything. And above all else was eternity. Forever was a long time - and living forever was overrated. Once you'd been everywhere and seen everything - though only at night time - what else was there to do with the countless centuries that lay ahead? Mortality - only being here for a brief sneeze of time and having to pack _everything_ into your allotted years - that was what gave life meaning. The knowledge that one day it would all end gave a certainty and a purpose to existence. Immortality stripped that away - but it took a good long time to realise that. And by the time you had figured it out … it was too late for you.

But Marcus swaggered with the arrogance of his youth. What was he 70? 80? That was nothing. And he'd been a vampire for less than a day. He was on top of the world right now and thought he knew it all. 'Oh, I know what I'm getting into,' he said. He looked at the old man in front of him - the dying body he would never have to inhabit again - and chuckled when he thought of everything that Angel had lost. 'It's you that doesn't seem to know what you had. As far as I can tell, you were the world's worst vampire! Vampires don't _help_ people you _moron_ \- they kill 'em. Here - let me show you.' He advanced on Angel.

But Angel didn't back away. Instead he held up his hand, as if to stop him. 'You may have the attitude, and you may have the power. But there's something that you don't have, and never will: friends.'

Over Marcus' shoulder he saw his team enter the room. 'Five of them,' he said, 'right behind you - and all carrying big, heavy things.'

Marcus spun around and faced the team. 'Guys! It's about time. It's _him_ -' he pointed at Angel, 'he's the one who's been casting that spell.'

'You're Angel?' Cordelia asked, arching an eyebrow, 'with that cologne? I don't _think_ so!'

Gunn levelled his crossbow directly at Marcus' chest - so that the bolt pointed to his unbeating heart.

'Don't stake him!' Angel warned.

'Angel, man, is that really you in there?' Doyle peered at the old man that stood in front of them. It was the man who had turned him, Doyle, away from the door. The half demon turned to look at Marcus. 'How come you turned me away but took Angel's body? What? Am I not good enough or somethin'?'

Marcus just laughed, and Doyle looked affronted. He looked the old man's real body up and down, 'beggars can't be choosers y'know, bud - no offence Angel, but y' look awful.'

'None taken - just get me back in my own body.'

'You think I'm ever gonna let that happen, huh?' Marcus pushed the crossbow away from his chest, and it fell from Gunn's hand. Then he raised the shuffleboard staff and thrust it at Wes and Gunn, sending them flying across the room. He swung the cue again at Doyle, who ducked and then straightened up and threw a punch of his own. His fist connected with Marcus' jaw but it didn't slow him down.

Marcus laughed. 'You know? There's a million reasons why I rejected you and took this body instead but this…' he slugged Doyle and the Irishman crumpled to the floor, '...super strength is just an unexpected bonus.' He dropped the staff and turned and ran for the door - but there he met Fred and Cordelia, who were waiting for him, baseball bats raised.

They launched their own attack and, down on the floor, Gunn grabbed the shuffleboard cue and swung it at Marcus' legs, bringing him down. The women closed in, but Marcus jumped to his feet and wrestled Fred's bat away from her. Then he turned on Angel - he would beat his own body to death, if that's what it took - and this lousy vampire's friends could watch him do it.

But, with his back turned, he didn't see Cordy pull out a tazer. She zapped him with it, and he was felled by the electric charge. He lay, face down, in a heap at Angel's feet. 'God I love technology,' Cordelia said. The she hurried over to Doyle and helped him up. 'are you OK?' she asked, 'did he hurt you?'

'I'm OK,' he rubbed his jaw, which was already beginning to bruise, and looked at Angel. 'Are you alright?'

'I gotta pee.'

The team looked at each other, and then chose to ignore him. 'Did you happen to notice a small Algurian conjuring orb?' Wesley asked him, 'it might have been glowing.'

'It's in his room - on a shrine.'

'Then I was right,' the watcher nodded, 'Algurian switching spell.' He looked down at the collapsed vampire's body, 'keep an eye on him.'

In response to his words, Fred hauled back with her bat and smashed the unconscious body over the head. Gunn and Doyle jumped back. Angel looked alarmed. 'Fred - he's out, he's out!'

...

Between them, Wesley and Gunn picked up the unconscious vampire and dragged him out of the rec room. Cordelia and Fred went on ahead, looking out for any orderlies or fellow patients who might remark on the group dragging a passed out man around. When they were sure the coast was clear, they signalled the others to follow. Doyle and Angel brought up the rear. 'How did you know to come here?' Angel asked.

'Ah - we just figured out when the last time you'd been acting like yourself was and worked backwards. Wes figured Marcus would show here too.'

'Acting like myself? Has he - uh - has he been… causing trouble?'

'Well,' Doyle twisted his mouth as he tried to think of a gentle way to put it. 'We knew somethin' was off about y' right from the start - y' kept hittin' on Cordy for one thing.'

'You know I would never do that,' Angel said, quickly. Too quickly. He cursed himself.

Doyle gave him a swift look, but then his expression cleared and he shrugged. 'Yeah - we know - _that's how we knew y' weren't y'self._ And I guessed "possessed" as far back as this mornin'. You ate my breakfast burrito!' He suddenly sounded annoyed as he remembered the outrage.

'Um - sorry?'

'Nah - wasn't you - and we all know that. But still…. There might be some damage limitation that needs doin', yeah?'

'Did he hurt anybody?'

'Fred's feelin's mostly. And there was some mystery brunette chick that we think he might have bit. No body, though; so, whoever she was, she isn't dead.'

'That's something, at least.'

'Yep - gotta look for them silver linin's.'

...

They arrived at Marcus' room, and Cordelia arranged two chairs so they were facing each other. Wes and Gunn dumped the unconscious body in one, and Cordy tied him to the chair. 'Don't make it too tight,' Angel told her, sitting down in the other chair, 'I don't want it to pinch when I get my body back.' She threw him an irritated look.

'Where is the orb?' Wesley asked. Angel pointed to where it sat on the shelf. The watcher took it down and then handed a scrap of paper to his friend. 'You need to read this,' he told him.

Angel squinted down at it. It was hard to read with Marcus' eyesight - his eyes were tired and weak, and everything was blurry. He could do with some special reading glasses. ' _Alli permutat anima kimota_ ,' he stuttered, ' _alli permutat anima kimota_.'

For a moment, he thought it hadn't worked, that nothing was happening. But then he felt the familiar lurch, as if his insides were being yanked out of his body. The team watched as blue white light flowed from the eyes and mouth of the old man and streamed towards the unconscious vampire. Red white light was flowing out of the vampire and making the crosswards journey. The two energy flows crossed in mid air, and then poured into the opposite body. Both heads sagged down onto their chests; but then, after a moment, Angel's body shuddered and, with a gasp, the vampire looked up. His friends stared back at him. 'It's OK,' he assured them, 'it's me.'

Gunn bent down to untie Angel's hands, just as Marcus woke up - back in his frail, old body. He saw the conjuring orb in Wesley's hand. 'You can't take that!' he said.

Angel took the orb from Wesley, tightened his fist around it and then crushed it into powder.

'You! You don't deserve that body!' the old man raged.

'That's funny, I was going to say the same to you.'

The team began to file out of the room. Doyle looked at the old man. 'And just for your information, bud, I'm every bit as good as Angel. You'd be lucky to have a body like mine.'

Marcus struggled to his feet. He ignored the Irishman and focused only on Angel - the man stealing the body he had wanted for all eternity. 'You're pathetic,' he cried, 'you're all pa -' he cut off as he felt shooting pain in his left arm, and his chest seize up.

'You know you really ought to keep a lid on that rage,' Angel told him, 'it isn't healthy.' He swept out of the room, as Marcus collapsed to the floor.

Ryan came running past, seeing the gang walking down the corridor. 'What's going on?' he demanded.

'Dad's having a bad night,' Angel told the orderly. And the team left the old folks home without a backwards glance.

* * *

They had all returned to the hotel and, now that the case was over, Wes and Gunn had left and gone home. Fred sat out in the garden, she had her book with her - but she was only pretending to read. She was still hurting. She knew that the man who had called her 'sweetheart' hadn't been Angel - that it wasn't he who had led her on and then made out with the next woman who came along, but it had felt so real. And it had left her confused. The real Angel had bought her popcorn and taken her to the movies and walked on the outside of the road. But the pretend Angel had told her she was beautiful and called her sweetheart - and the real Angel had never done anything like that. And she knew, more strongly than ever, that she wanted him to. But apparently that just wasn't his way...

'Hey,' a voice interrupted her. It was Cordelia. 'How are you doing?'

'Me? Oh - Oh - I'm fine, right as rain!' Fred replied, garbling her words in her effort to pretend she was OK. Then she closed her mouth and kept her eyes firmly on the page. But she hadn't fooled Cordy - few people could.

'I was wondering if we could maybe talk?' she said, settling down next to Fred on the bench.

'Talk - OK-sure… you're not gonna make me go out to Caritas and get shot at again are you?'

'No, that isn't on my agenda this time.'

Cordelia looked down at her feet, and Fred felt a twinge of guilt. 'I'm sorry,' she said, 'I know you didn't mean for those guys to shoot the whole place up… we were supposed to be safe - I guess you were as surprised as anybody.'

'I was - I really was. I don't want to hurt you, Fred - you know that, right?'

Fred nodded. She hadn't trusted the consort for a long time - and she was still uncomfortable around the King of the monsters. But she remembered how Cordy had put her arm around her and faced down a gun, refusing to leave the club without the other woman. It seemed that, despite being chosen for the Com-shuk by the monster who wore a golden crown and sat on a golden throne, whilst all the bad things happened in his land; the consort had a good heart after all - and wanted to protect people.

'I guess my head's still a little screwy after Pylea,' Fred admitted. 'I don't feel like I fit in here anymore and I'm waiting for everything to make sense again, I keep waiting for the click in my brain when everything will be alright again, but it's like the earth keeps moving under my feet. And up is down and black is white and Angel's buying me popcorn and then he's possessed. Most days I struggle just to remember what I'm supposed to be doing, never mind understand what everyone else is doing. I forget the rules sometimes.'

'Pfft - I never follow the rules, rules are for everyone else,' Cordelia snorted, but then she made her voice gentle, 'but you can trust me Fred - you can trust all of us here… as long as we're not possessed that is. And you can always talk to us - if you're confused, or scared or unsure of _anything._ '

'I guess I know it.'

'We all want what's best for you and to protect you… from any harm or hurt.'

'Well… thanks.'

Cordelia took a deep breath, 'and in the spirit of protecting you,' she began, 'there's something I need to tell you - about Angel. It's a long, and frankly quite boring, story. But there's some things that you need to understand about him - and I don't trust him to get it right when he tells you this himself…'

* * *

Angel and Doyle had sequestered themselves in Wesley's office - now that the boss had gone home - talking through the events of the previous 24 hours. Doyle was fixing them both a drink. 'Martini?' he asked Angel.

The vampire looked surprised. 'What am I? Some kind of 70s playboy?'

Doyle chuckled to himself, 'just checkin' it's really you, man.' He got the bottle of scotch out, and placed the tumblers on the desk - pouring them both a slug.

'This is more like it,' Angel said, taking the drink. He slung it back, and then put the glass down and looked at his friend. 'So was it really bad?'

'Well I'm not forgivin' the burrito any time soon - and I don't think Cordy appreciated all the come ons. Neither did I for that matter.'

'He came on to you, as well?'

Doyle laughed - 'no, I'm apparently not his type,' his voice was still tinged with a bit of bitterness when he considered that his body wasn't deemed good enough for a pensioner to want to steal. 'But he did try and tactfully break up with Wesley, now I think about it.'

' _What?_ Why?'

'Mistaken identity,' Doyle chuckled, 'the perils of Fred havin' a boy's name.' He sighed. 'Therein lies the worst of it… he really hurt Fred. Came onto her - and she's not Cordy, she was receptive - promised her a night on the town and then dumped her for some other woman - right here on the desk.'

Angel sniffed the air, experimentally. 'Lilah,' he said.

' _Eww!_ ' Doyle was disgusted, 'what was she doin' here?'

But the vampire shrugged - he hadn't been present in the room at the time.

'Well - putting the incredibly worryin' visit from my own personal arch nemesis aside - this afternoon has really complicated matters with you and Fred. You know that mature chat we said you needed to have with her? Well it's now got a lot harder, and it's marked urgent.'

'Damn - I'll get on it.'

Doyle nodded, 'and what about you, bud - how're you holdin' up after everythin'?'

Angel took a moment to consider the question. 'I guess… I don't know - I guess. Being possessed, body switching - that's just another day on the job for us, right? It's not like I ever considered the possibility that we wouldn't sort this out. Trying to escape from the old folks home and getting stopped by _Ryan_ was frustrating. There was a real sense of powerlessness, you know?'

Doyle took another drink and nodded again. 'Welcome to the way of the world for the rest of us, bud. I think sometimes you forget that, in a lot of ways, bein' a superhero gives you an easier ride.'

'Yeah - but there are things I don't get to have, too. Being Marcus for the day just reinforced that.'

The Irishman looked at him quizzically. 'All the things you're missin' out on - I can't imagine you got that in the old folks home.. Unless you're about to tell me somethin' _really_ kinky. In which case, stop a moment - I need more scotch before I hear this.'

The vampire smiled, wryly. 'No - I didn't mean sex. I wasn't talking about my curse.'

'Colour me grateful.'

'I meant… I had a heart beat, Doyle. I saw it, as well - on the monitor. Just feeling that steady thump in my chest, knowing I was alive. Even with the aches and the pains and the blurry vision and the constant need to pee, that heartbeat… it made everything worthwhile.'

Doyle didn't say anything in response, and after a moment's quiet, Angel began to talk again. 'Marcus was connected, you know? To life - to humanity. He didn't even appreciate it. But he was a part of this world in a way I never can be. There was this other resident - his daughter had just had a baby, and he gave her to me to hold. This tiny little life… so helpless, so full of potential. It's something I can never have. And it's something that everyone else just takes for granted...starting a family.'

Doyle poured himself another drink, he had stopped looking at his friend.

'And it made me realise,' Angel continued, 'more than I already knew it - that I'm gonna watch you guys stay connected to the world even when you're with me. You and Cordelia will get married and start a family...'

Doyle downed the scotch.

'... Wes and Gunn and Fred will meet people, and do the same. You'll grow up, grow old, move on. And I'll still be stuck here - frozen in time - like a mosquito trapped in amber. You know it's funny. Marcus got to lead a normal life, and he didn't want it. I live an extraordinary one and all I want is to be normal - bad eyesight and bladder problems included. I guess the grass is always greener, huh?'

'I guess it is.'

Doyle still wasn't looking at his friend, and Angel wrinkled his brow in confusion, 'are you OK?'

'Huh? What?... yeah. Just tired, I guess. Ready for home.'

'Yeah - and I'd better talk to Fred.'

They both hauled themselves to their feet. Doyle put the scotch away, and they left the office.

...

As they entered the lobby, they saw Cordelia also coming in, from outside. 'Fred's out there,' she said to Angel, 'now might be a good time to…'

He nodded, and watched as Cordy walked straight past him and wrapped her arms around Doyle, giving him a quick kiss on the lips. 'You ready for home?' he asked her. Angel began to turn away.

'Are you?' Cordelia was asking, 'I thought that seeming as the night is still … well OK it's a little mature and all, but that just means El Matador will be all the more deserted.'

'Yeah?' Whatever had been bothering the Irishman, just a moment before, seemed to melt away. He perked up immediately on hearing her words. 'You still wanna?'

'If you still want to?'

'Oh I definitely still want to!' He was positively beaming now. 'We're goin' skinny dippin',' he told his friend, 'I'd invite y' along but…'

'You're not welcome,' Cordelia finished.

Angel nodded. He tried to keep his expression impassive, but there was a definite lurching feeling in the pit of his stomach - not unlike the feeling of having his essence ripped from his body. 'Have fun - I'll just go and talk to Fred.' He began to walk away, and Cordelia wriggled out of Doyle's arms so she could fetch her purse. Just as Angel reached the door to the courtyard, he heard the phone begin to ring. He ignored it and headed on out to Fred.

...

Cordelia sighed, and put her purse back down. 'We could just leave it, Cordy,' Doyle said to her, 'we have plans - it's the middle o' the night!'

'Which means it could be important - it might be a paying client.'

'Then they can ring again in the morning. Cordelia I forbid you to…'

But Cordelia was not one to be forbidden - and she never did what Doyle told her to, anyway. She picked up the receiver, stuck her tongue out at her boyfriend, and began to speak. Doyle folded his arms across his chest and looked aggrieved.

'Angel investigations, we help the hopeless…. _Willow?_ '

* * *

Fred was still out in the courtyard - still pretending to read. Angel came down the steps behind her, 'hi.'

She closed the book and turned to look at him, 'hey - how's your head? S-sorry about all that.' She mimed swinging a baseball bat.

Angel smiled. 'It's OK - ah - I gather I had it coming.' He sat down beside her, and she nodded.

'Fred- there's something I've been meaning to talk to you about.'

'OK.'

But instead of talking, he just sat still, staring ahead of him into the night, wondering where to start. The woman took pity on him, put her book down next to her, and shifted so that she could see him better. 'Is this about how you're not like other men… what with the curse and all… and you're really fond of me but that's as far as it goes?' Her voice was sad.

'Uhm...yeah.'

'Cordelia explained it to me,' she told him. She shook her head slightly, and gave a rueful chuckle, 'she said you'd probably just screw it up.'

'Oh. She did, did she? ... and she's probably right.'

Fred sighed, and looked down. 'It's like something out of Fitzgerald. The man who could have everything but love. Well, maybe in some ways you're better off, because love is - well in a way it's everything. But it's also heartache and disappointment.' She tried to smile - and make her voice a little lighter, 'and those are good things to avoid.'

Angel wasn't sure what to say to that. Fred was baring her soul and he - well, Cordelia was right, talking would risk screwing everything up. He wasn't good with the talking. But at the same time, the woman's heartfelt words deserved some better response than a 'yeah,' or a 'I hear you.'

He tried to think of something equally poetic to say in response - though he was drawing a blank… but he was saved by the sudden sound of running footsteps.

...

Cordelia burst through the door into the courtyard, she was panting for breath and her cheeks were red. But her eyes were excited - and her smile was huge. 'Angel! Willow's on the phone… she's alive! Buffy's alive!' And then she turned and ran back inside.

Fred and Angel looked at each other for a long moment, quiet and still. And then Angel jumped to his feet and raced inside after Cordelia.

Fred was left all alone, sitting on the side of the fountain, her face confused. 'Buffy?'


	17. Fredless: Part One

Wesley stared down the length of the silver blade that was brandished in his face. 'You wouldn't dare,' he said, trying to keep his voice steady. 'You were just going to toss in a Prothgarian broadsword with a third century ceremonial Sancteus dagger?'

Cordelia gazed at the weapon in her hand, 'hmm - let's see - long, metal, pointy - yup!'

Wesley began to protest.

The gang were taking inventory of all the weapons that they kept at the hotel - and the British man kept giving speeches about the purpose of an inventory, every time one of the team showed less respect than he would like towards the arsenal. Doyle was keeping a tally - so far it was 15 speeches. Cordelia was the worst offender - and had been on the receiving end of most of them, she had taken to imitating Wesley every time he opened his mouth - her British accent had come a long way in just the last twenty minutes. She had had 9 rebukes from the watcher. Doyle and Gunn were on 3 apiece - and the competition between them was getting tense as to who would edge ahead - and who would end up watcher's pet.

'This wasn't my idea,' Wesley told Cordelia, stuffily. She rolled her eyes at him. No she knew it was Angel's idea - he had been complaining about the difference to his weapons cabinet ever since he had returned from his summer retreat. But Angel wasn't the boss - Wesley was - and he should stand up to the vampire when he got all irritating and fussy, not kowtow to his time consuming demands.

'What time is it?' Fred was down on the floor, fiddling with a weird contraption of her own invention. It looked like a weird hybrid of a suitcase, a crossbow and a sewing machine. But, busy as she was, she kept on requesting the time.

Wesley held his wrist out, and Cordelia read from his watch, 'six twenty four, and for those of you playing the home game: that's exactly three minutes since the last time you asked.'

'Yeah but - in Fred's defence - time does go more slowly when you're categorising and labelling weapons for an anal vampire who isn't even here,' Doyle pointed out. 'You say three minutes - but it feels like three hours.' He winked at the woman on the floor.

'I have this theory that the more aware you are of time the more slowly it moves,' Fred told them, looking carefully at her contraption and not at the team. 'Which could make light speed travel possible, but only if you were to concentrate really…'

'He'll be back when he's back,' Cordelia interrupted her.

'And not a moment before,' Doyle added.

Cordelia looked at her boyfriend, pointedly. 'I don't see what you're complaining about, either, your not exactly helping, sat up there at the counter.'

'I'm contributin' in lots o' important ways!'

She just arched an eyebrow at him, and continued on sorting the weapons.

'So - now that she's alive again, do you think they'll get back together? Angel - and that girl with the goofy name?' Fred asked.

Doyle snorted, 'now there's a thought!'

Wesley started out a bit gentler in his response, however, and crouched down beside her to talk to her. 'Well, _Fred_ , that's a difficult question.' He glanced up at the others, and began to grin at the thought, 'I think it's fair to say - no. Not a chance, never, no way, not in a million years and also nuh uh.'

'And that's puttin' it mildly!'

'But you said he loved her!' Fred protested. 'And of course she's gonna love him back, because he's so strong and handsome and he really listens when you talk.' Her face took on a dreamy, far away expression, and then she caught herself out and began to correct her words, 'I-I mean if you go for that sort of thing, why wouldn't it work?'

'Lady's got a point,' Doyle agreed, 'I'm strong and handsome and I really listen when people talk - and the women all flock to me!'

This time it was Cordelia's turn to snort. 'Oh please! _I_ don't even flock to you and I'm in love with you. And as for that other stuff… pft! You wish!'

'Ah - you can't get enough of me, Princess.' His green eyes took on their roguish twinkle, and he pulled Cordelia in close for a kiss. She pushed him away, laughing.

Fred watched them the whole time. 'That's what I mean… they're in love - like you guys. Don't they want to be together?'

'Let me break this down for you Fred,' Cordelia said, 'and you have to remember Buffy and Angel are superfreaks - they are nothing like me and Doyle, they live for the melodrama and the histrionics. It's pretty unhealthy. Their whole three year relationship went a little something like _this_ …' She pulled herself out of Doyle's arms and stepped away from the counter; fluttering her hands and putting on a falsetto voice. 'Oh - Angel! I know that - I am a slayer and - you're a vampire - and it would be _impossible_ for us to _be_ together… but.'

Doyle and Gunn began to snigger at her act.

'But,' Wesley suddenly said, standing up. Cordelia turned to look at him. He took off his glasses and looked around for somewhere to put them, before dropping them on the floor. Then he adopted an American accent and made his voice gruffer. 'Sometimes my gypsy curse prevents me from seeing the truth! Oh Buffy!' He gazed up to the heavens.

Cordelia had turned her back on Wes, to look coy and conflicted, but she spun around at that. 'Yes, Angel?' she panted.

Wesley balled his fists, ' _I love you so much I almost forgot to_ _**brood**_!'

Fred watched on in wide eyed wonder, as Doyle and Gunn began to chuckle even harder. Cordelia turned her back on the watcher, again, 'and just because I sent you to hell that one time doesn't mean that we can't be friends.'

Wesley grabbed her arm and twisted her towards himself, 'or possibly more?'

She twisted away again, and raised her hand to her brow to show her distress, gasping. 'Gasp! No! We mustn't.'

But Wesley pulled her back towards him, holding her close. 'Kiss me!' he demanded.

'No! Bite me!' Cordelia cried, still in falsetto. Doyle threw back his head and roared with laughter, as Wesley swept Cordelia down into a dip, like they were finishing a tango, and pretended to sink his fangs into her neck.

'Why don't you both bite me!' Angel's voice cut in.

'You're back!' Fred jumped to her feet looking delighted. Cordelia and Wesley immediately straightened up and separated, looking a little abashed.

'Y'know - I was just about to jump in there and defend y', bud,' Doyle said to the vampire.

The vampire looked unconvinced. 'Uhuh.'

'So - how'd it go?' Gunn asked.

'I think those two pretty much summed it up,' Angel admitted, 'I _really_ don't want to talk about it.'

Cordelia looked put out. 'But - ah - we're your friends.' She gave him her biggest smile - the one she normally reserved for commercials - 'and, and it's not healthy to repress stuff like _this_.' Angel just stared at her, with an expression like granite, but she wasn't deterred. 'You need to share your pain - express those feelings of grief and longing or else …. The curiosity is gonna kill me!'

'Oh no. Wouldn't want that.' Angel's voice was quiet - but everyone still heard.

Fred grinned at him, 'I personally don't care what happened at all.'

'Shut up, Fred,' Cordelia was in no mood for anyone sucking up.

'Actually - you know what I want right now? Ice cream,' Angel looked at Fred and smiled. 'You wanna get some ice cream?'

The young woman blushed, and her grin grew massive. 'I like ice cream.'

'Great.'

The two of them left the hotel together. Cordelia watched them go - her expression both glum and irritated. 'And now we'll never know what happened,' she sighed.

'That's right,' Angel's voice floated in from outside.

Damn his vampire hearing!

* * *

'This has been the best night ever!' Fred enthused, as she and Angel made their way through the dank sewer tunnels. First there had been the offer of ice cream - now they had the ice cream - and then a monster had jumped out of the freezer and Angel had done his brave protector act, and now here they were in the sewers. Fred looked around them, 'they're just so bleak and oppressive and - homey - I could build a condo down here.'

'I'm glad you're having fun,' Angel smiled.

They were tracking a Durslar beast - the monster that had jumped out of the freezer at them. They tended to stick to sewers and didn't like to come above ground. Fred was envious of that lifestyle, 'they get to live a life of mysterious sewage,' she said, 'while I'm just plain ol' boring ol' Fred.'

Angel glanced at the tiny woman, calmly eating her ice cream as she tracked a monster through the sewers. 'Boring isn't a word I would use to describe you,'

'Fine. Nutty ol' goonie bird doin' nothing up in her room but mooching off Angel, Fred. I swear I don't know how you all put up with me. I practically need flashcards to understand my…' she cut herself off, as she noticed something over Angel's shoulder. 'Pretty crystals! Look they're everywhere.' The crystals were glistening on the tunnel walls, and she stepped towards them to inspect them. There was a distant, rumbling roaring sound and she jumped backwards, 'that wasn't me!'

Angel began to laugh. They must be near the Durslar's lair. He told Fred to head back to the hotel, but the woman worried that, rather than abandon him, she would be better calling for backup. But Angel shook his head - Durslars sounded scary, but their bark was worse than their bite. 'Do you think you can find your way back OK?' he asked.

'I think so. 128 metres back. Eastward fork. 207 metres to the southward fork, hang a right, 12 metres in…' she trailed off from her recitation as she saw Angel's expression. 'I'm just being a big nerd again, aren't I?' Angel nodded, and she grinned self deprecatingly. 'I'll just go.' She scuttled away, and Angel began to walk towards the sound of the Durslar - but stopped when he heard Fred call out to check that he would be OK without her. He assured her he was fine, and she walked off again, before sticking her head back round the tunnel to check once again. He laughed - he would be fine! And Fred finally left him alone. The Durslar beast crept up behind him...

* * *

Back at the Hyperion the rest of the gang were still busy with their inventory - or at least, Wesley was busy. The rest of them had lapsed into bored inactivity. 'Three pronged scythian death spear, category six.' He wrote a label and tagged it, 'weapons cabinet third shelf.'

He passed the spear to Cordelia who looked annoyed, 'why me?' but then she sighed and went to put it away. She couldn't face another 'purpose of an inventory' speech.

'You know,' Wesley said, resting for a moment and looking at the spear where it now hung in the cabinet, 'back in my days as a rogue demon hunter, I once used that spear to pin down what I thought was a small rodentius demon… of course, the poodle's owners weren't very happy.'

Gunn rolled his eyes,'yo Irish, would you hurry up and get a vision already?'

'Believe me, bud, I've been prayin' for one for the last twenty minutes - ever since the anecdote about the fifth century Olturian dagger and the stray cat… that was a sad story, I like cats.'

Wesley looked aggrieved, and clucked his tongue with impatience. 'The purpose of an inventory…' he began.

'We know already!' Cordelia interrupted.

Doyle marked another tally on his score sheet. 'Was that one aimed at me or Gunn?' he asked the watcher.

'I like to think it was a joint effort,' the street fighter said.

'You just don't wanna be Wesley's golden boy.'

'That I don't!'

Wesley clucked his tongue again. Cordelia suddenly cursed, and all the men stopped to look at her. 'Ow,' she said, and began to hobble over to the sofa, rubbing her shin, 'ow!'

'You hurt yourself, darlin'?'

She threw her boyfriend a dark look, 'y'think? No - I'm just grunting in pain for the fun of it - dammit!' She sat down and rubbed her leg harder. 'Fred's toy!' she exclaimed, 'I wish she wouldn't leave it lying around.'

'Pretty wicked looking toy,' Gunn said, eyeing up the blade that was attached to the top.

'I'll say,' Wesley crouched down to better examine it. 'It looks like a spring loaded decapitation device.'

'Or it makes toast,' Cordelia said, her voice still annoyed, as she continued to try and rub away the pain, 'with Fred you never know.'

'Ah excuse me is this Angel investigations?' A male voice, with a Texan twang to it, cut through the lobby. The gang turned and saw a middle aged couple standing by the door.

Wesley stood back up, 'yes it is, can we help you?'

'My name is Roger,' the man said, 'this is my wife, Trish - we sure are sorry to barge in on your - arsenal - here, but we really need to talk to you.'

* * *

Wesley showed the couple through to his office and introduced the rest of the gang. He sat down behind his desk, whilst Roger and Trish sat on the chairs across from him and began to outline their story. Their daughter was missing.

'Oh no!' said Cordelia, 'kidnapped by evil fiends?'

Trish looked unsettled, 'we're not sure,' her voice was filled with disquiet and she gave Cordelia an odd look.

Wesley began to make notes, 'and was your daughter involved in any kind of demon worship?' he asked.

'Of course not!' Roger sounded outraged.

'Well it might be demon worshippers who took her as a sacrifice…' Doyle said, thoughtfully.

Gunn nodded. 'Or it might be a vampire,' he added. 'Hard luck tracking one of them in a city this big, but don't worry. We're detectives. We can find anyone.'

Behind the couple's head, Doyle made a cutting motion across his throat, trying to shut Gunn up. 'We suck at that,' he mouthed at his associate.

'We already hired a detective,' Roger said, he was beginning to sound confused.

Wesley nodded, thoughtfully, 'and he couldn't locate her.'

'Well he probably didn't know what to look for,' Doyle said. The others all nodded their agreement.

Roger and Trish looked very confused now, and the man glanced around the members of the team, his expression becoming annoyed. 'He said she was staying here - in your hotel!'

'Her name is Winifred Burkle,' Trish told them, 'we call her Fred.'

The whole team stared at each other.

* * *

Fred came up into the lobby through the basement. She was still happily licking her ice cream cone. This was a good evening. Angel was back. He wasn't dating that girl with the goofy name and apparently he never would. She had ice cream. And she'd had a trip to the sewers. All in all, she was pretty happy.

The lobby was deserted, now - though the weapons still lay strewn across the floor. It seemed unlike Wesley to just leave them there and go home - something must have come up. Hearing voices, she walked across the empty foyer and peered through the open door into Wes' office. The whole team was in there.

Then she saw the two people sitting across from Wesley. She froze. After a moment's indecision, she turned and ran away up the stairs to her room.

* * *

'Fred's your daughter?' Gunn's voice was disbelieving, though Doyle was beginning to nod to himself. The Texas accents - they should've realised. They really did suck at the detective game… he wasn't being hypercritical when he derided their skills - just realistic.

Trish turned to look at Gunn, her face and voice were hopeful when she heard this man talk about her daughter in a familiar way. 'Yes,' she nodded, 'do you know her?' There was a note of desperation in her voice, as well, alongside the tinge of hope.

'Is she here?' is she alright?' Roger glanced between the team members again - hoping to garner the truth from their expressions. But Wesley was quick to assure him that she was absolutely fine - albeit out, at the moment, with another of their associates.

'Who is not an evil fiend - or a vampire - because they don't exist!' Cordelia said, in a falsely cheerful voice. 'In case you aren't familiar with our L.A gumshoe detective slang.' Doyle shook his head… as Cordelia's cover stories went, it was only marginally better than the time she had pretended she was going to use Lorne's decapitated head as a planter… or maybe it was marginally worse? But, fortunately, Mr. and Mrs. Burkle weren't really interested in anything but Fred's whereabouts. It had been five years since they had seen her or heard from her. They wanted to know if their daughter had been with the gang the whole time.

'No,' Wesley told them, 'we've only known Fred for a few months, really. You see, we found her in…'

'A fit of depression!' Cordelia cut in, sounding a bit manic as she thought up yet another lie. Doyle tried to suppress a smirk; his Cordelia: queen of the cover story.

'Fred was depressed?' Trish asked. The whole gang nodded, solemnly. 'Over what?'

It was Wesley that fielded this one, blustering about relocating and having trouble adjusting. He was quick to change the subject - asking how they had managed to find her again after all this time.

It turned out that, about a month ago, Fred had sent them a letter. She hadn't put a return address on the envelope and had told them not to bother looking for her, assuring them that she was fine. 'But after five years of not knowing if our daughter was alive or…' Trish said. How could they just let that go? So they had hired the private eye.

'And he tracked her down through an envelope?' Gunn asked, sounding impressed. Then, after a moment: 'we could do that.'

Doyle coughed, pointedly, 'no we couldn't.'

...

'Wait 'til you guys hear what happened at the Hagen Daaz,' Angel's voice came floating into the office from out in the lobby. 'Ordinarily these things don't put up much of a fight, but this one? Hoo! I think I'm gonna have it..' he trailed off as he appeared into the doorway and saw Mr. and Mrs. Burkle. 'Hello,' he said. He was carrying the Durslar's decapitated head. Doyle closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Talk about bad timing.

'Angel!' Cordelia greeted him, though her voice was taking on an edge of hysteria. 'You're - alone - and you brought ...a prop! From your movie.'

Doyle took another deep breath. You know, if he didn't trust Cordelia so implicitly he might begin to worry about how quickly she could think up lies. The queen liar in chief, herself, was now talking to Fred''s parents, again. 'This is Angel,' she explained. 'He makes monster movies.' She turned back to the vampire. 'Angel, these are Fred's very _normal_ parents.'

Angel hid the head behind his back. 'Ah - Fred has parents.'

'Two of 'em,' Doyle agreed, 'like everybody else.'

* * *

Up in her room, Fred was attempting to wipe all of her writing from the walls - to erase the evidence of her uneasy mind, and the story of the girl far from home - hiding in a cave. She couldn't let them see - couldn't let them know she'd been here. But the pen she had used was permanent marker - and her scribblings stayed resolutely on the wall. She couldn't do it. She had to get out. They couldn't find her here. She grabbed the clothes that lay on her bed, and shoved them into a bag.

* * *

Angel smiled at the middle aged couple, trying to hide his surprise and discomfort - as well as the decapitated head. 'Well, it sure is nice to meet you both.'

'Uh - son - your prop is dripping,' Roger said to him.

Angel took the head out from behind his back, seeing the green demon blood oozing out of it. 'Yeah - this thing,' he began to laugh, rather unconvincingly, and swung the head around - causing Roger and Trish to duck. 'It's fake,' he assured them, 'you know a little glue - paper mache…' he threw it over his shoulder, back out into the lobby, in order to get rid of it. They all heard the sound of smashing glass as it hit the weapons cabinet. Doyle gave up, and just buried his head in hands.

'Possibly some lead,' Angel finished up. 'So - uh - Fred's parents…. We've heard - so much, well uhm, sure is nice to meet you folks.'

Doyle decided to risk coming up for some air. Gunn was still dwelling on the letter. 'No address anywhere on the envelope?' he asked again.

'No, none' Roger assured him.

'Damn!'

'Do you know when Fred will be back?' Roger asked Angel.

The vampire looked across at the others, who all stared back at him. 'Oh - me, right ...Well - ah - yeah, I sent her right back here, before I picked up that … prop. So I'm sure she's up in her room. Right now.'

The Burkles smiled at each other, relief and hope evident on their faces.

...

But it was not to be. Fred's room was empty - and looking incredibly tidy and well organised, very different to the way the woman normally kept it. 'She's not here,' Roger said. He sounded disappointed, but there was also an accusation in his voice.

Angel picked the ice cream cone wrapper from up off the floor, 'no, but she was.'

This was proof - Fred had come back to the hotel - got back safely - and chosen to leave again. Why?

Trish walked over to the walls and began to examine the scrawl she found there. 'This is Fred's writing,' she said - reaching out to touch this first sign of her daughter, first proof of her continued existence in five years. She frowned as she read it, 'but what does this mean? It's just crazy.'

Roger stood by her shoulder, 'we may have to call them in sooner than we thought,' he muttered.

Cordelia and the men stood huddled in the doorway. 'Guys,' she hissed, 'when was the last time Fred left the hotel by herself?'

'A couple of weeks after never,' Gunn replied.

'And now she's cleared out her stuff and taken off - into the big city, alone,' Doyle added.

'So what is she running from?' Wesley finished up. The small group stared across the room to Fred's parents, who still stood reading the walls.

* * *

Fred had her bag slung over her shoulder, and she scurried down the street. It was dark and she was scared - but she had to get away. Far away. And she was going to need help to accomplish that...


	18. Fredless: Part Two

The gang had barricaded themselves into the office, leaving Mr. and Mrs. Burkle out in the lobby, sitting on the round sofa. 'There's something off about them,' Cordelia whispered, peeking out into the lobby, 'I can't put my finger on it.' But she didn't have to be specific - the men all agreed with her.

As far as they could tell, Fred had returned to the hotel - as the ice cream wrapper proved - seen her parents, and taken off again. And that wasn't a good sign.

Something else was troubling Gunn, though - the story Fred's parents had told. They had said that she had sent them a letter… but he was having difficulty imagining Fred sneaking out of the hotel all by herself to go and post a letter. Cordelia was in agreement. 'Pft, sneaking off! Right! Fred can barely tie her shoes without Mr. "oh you're my big, fat hero" around.'

'You think I'm fat?' Angel asked, quietly, sounding a little upset. Doyle gave him a funny look.

'This might be a ruse,' Wesley thought aloud, 'to trick us into letting them get close to her. Make it look like she initiated contact.'

'On the other hand - if she did write a letter, and told them not to contact her, there must be a reason for that,' Angel pointed out.

'Fred never talks about her family,' Cordelia said.

'She doesn't talk about much, to be fair,' Doyle told her, 'and what she does say a lot o' the time is… unintelligible - at least to me it is. And it's not like any o' us are always chattin' on about our home lives for her to join in and swap stories about the old homestead.'

'My parents are dead,' Angel said.

'Because you killed them! 200 years ago!' the Irishman rebutted.

'Mine are dead too,' agreed Gunn. 'I didn't kill 'em though.'

'Mine are in jail,' Cordelia admitted,

'and ours are all back in Europe, Doyle,' Wesley finished up, 'it isn't the same thing at all. But why wouldn't she tell us if she was planning to contact them?'

No one could come up with an answer to that. Angel shoved his hands into his pockets. 'So where do we start?' he asked. He looked around at each member of the team, but they all stayed silent, and looked down at their shoes. 'Where would Fred go?'

'We could hit all of the local taco stands.' Everyone stared at the street fighter, 'joke,' he raised his hands up in surrender - but then he shrugged, 'sort of.'

'Come on guys, think! What do we know about Fred?'

'Well I knew about the tacos.'

Angel thought carefully, and then remembered how happy Fred had seemed down in the sewers - he would check them out. Wesley suggested the public library - as the place she had used to work. She might feel at home there, or go there for help. 'What about them?' Cordelia asked, peeking back out into the lobby. Roger looked up and saw her looking and she ducked back inside the room, 'we can't just leave them here, what if Fred comes back!'

* * *

Out in the lobby, Roger watched as the head of the young woman whipped out of view and back into the office. She had been watching them - spying on them. 'Is it time yet?' he asked his wife.

'Not yet.'

* * *

'OK,' Wesley said, 'Angel, Gunn - you go down into the sewers, see if you can find her there. Doyle and Cordelia - you go to the public library. That's our least likely option - so you take Mr. and Mrs. Burkle with you - keep them distracted.'

'We can do that.'

'I can be very distractin'.'

'What will you do?' Cordelia asked the boss.

He was going to stay at the hotel - in case Fred did try to sneak back in. He wanted a chance to talk to her about her family without her parents around.

'Y'know this place is pretty big - 68 rooms and all, and we only checked the one. Plus the basement, and the industrial sized kitchen, and the attics. She might not have even left,' Doyle said. 'Have a look around whilst we're out - think of it as a big game o' hide and seek.'

'Er - yes.' The watcher got to his feet, and led the team out of the office. 'Mr. and Mrs Burkle? We're going to try a few places we think Fred might have gone to. Doyle and Cordelia are going to be checking likely places in the city, if you would care to accompany them.'

Roger eyeballed him, 'and what will the rest of you be doing?'

Angel answered him, 'well I'm ah - gonna check some of my industry contacts. Gunn's coming too.'

'Industry contacts?' Trish furrowed her brow, 'why would… Fred's not " _making movies"_ is she?'

'Movies?' Angel looked blank. But the coughing fit Doyle went into tipped him off. 'Oh you mean… no! No, no, of course not. It's just some of these contacts, they know things sometimes… they're, ah, underground.'

'And what will you be doing?' Roger asked, still looking at Wesley.

The British man cleared his throat. 'As the boss, I'm - uh - command central, base of operations. Everyone checks in with me and I stay here in case Fred should - um - turn up. Right, well,' he clapped his hands together, 'off you all go then - busy busy.'

Cordelia and Doyle led the Burkles out of the hotel. Angel gave Wesley one last glance, 'call if you…'

'Yeah.'

* * *

Lorne had tried to ignore the banging on the door, but it just grew more persistent. Smoking a cigarette, and wearing his terrycloth robe, he pushed his way through the bead curtain and headed for the door, muttering to himself. As he walked past, he stubbed his cigarette out into an ashtray sitting on top of a table. The table collapsed and all the bottles that had stood on it crashed to the floor. The Host didn't even react - he was too used to chaos in his club now - he just continued his shuffle to the front door.

'Can't you read the sign on the door,' he grumbled, as he pushed the button that unlocked it, 'se hable "closed".' Fred came down the steps. 'Oh, Fred, it's you, the bar is closed.' He turned to walk away, 'good seeing you. It's been fun. Bye bye.'

But Fred wasn't listening, she took a deep breath and launched into tuneless song. _'Row row row your boat,'_ she bleated, as she scurried after the retreating demon.

'Ouch!' he stopped in his tracks, 'turn the sirens down a notch, would you? All that fear and panic is blowing out my fuses.'

'I'm sorry,' she said to him, and took a deep breath, 'but something awful has happened.'

Lorne arched an eyebrow and surveyed the chaos of the room around him, 'oh gee - I wonder what that's like.'

Fred followed his gaze; taking in the broken bottles, the collapsed tables, the overturned chairs. 'Oh no, was there another massacre?'

The Host tutted. No. No new massacre. One was enough

'I'm not - I'm sorry - I don't wanna sound… why is it still like this?'

The green demon sighed, 'Fred, honey, you're not here to discuss the interior decorating.' He found a table that was still standing, righted the upside down lamp and pulled out a chair, indicating the opposite one for Fred. 'so what can I do for you?'

She wanted cash, she told him - she needed it. And she didn't want to talk about it because she thought her head might just about explode if she needed to think about what had happened. She just had to get out. She began to sing for him again, but he stopped her. There was no need for the woman to sing, her aura was screaming.

He looked at her, his expression gentle and kind. 'So you thought you could outrun them? And maybe you were free… but those old monsters hunted you down. I know why you're running away, Fred. You know what your problem is?'

She bit her lip and looked downwards, 'I'm not strong enough to stay and face my fear?'

'No... you haven't run far enough.'

* * *

A rat ran along the sewer pipe at the top of the tunnel. Gunn watched it with disgust, as it scurried past overhead. 'Man I hate rats! How come I got stuck on sewer duty with you?' he complained to Angel.

'Because if we run into anything fanged and dangerous, you're my best backup - and we all know it.'

'We're looking for Fred - not uglies that go bump in the night.'

'And in this town we might just get both - now quit whining.' He raised his voice and called down the tunnel. 'Fred? Fred! It's just me! And Gunn… we're alone.'

'I got tacos!' Gunn held up a takeout bag. Angel gave him a look. 'What?' the street fighter said.

'She's a missing person - not a stray cat we're trying to lure in with some treats.'

'Yeah but - the girl likes to eat.' He switched back to calling out, 'Fred? We just wanna talk to you!'

'Yeah - listen - this thing, whatever it is - with your parents. You know we can help you out - Fred?'

Another rat ran past - this one on the floor - it ran right over Gunn's foot. The street fighter let out a piercing shriek.

'What are you doing?' Angel hissed, as Gunn hopped around on one leg.

'It touched me - oh god it touched me - I gotta take a shower!'

'Come on.' The vampire grabbed his associate, and dragged him on down the tunnel.

Two glowing blue eyes peered around from a recess, and watched the men as they continued on their way. 'When we tell this story back at the hotel - we're gonna turn that piercing shriek into a manly bellow, though, right?' Gunn said, as they disappeared out of view.

* * *

Cordelia led Trish through the stacks in the public library. 'Does Fred come here a lot?' the older woman asked.

Cordelia thought for a moment '...well - it was Doyle that met her first - and this was the very first place he saw her.'

'Uhuh - does _he_ come to the public library a lot?'

'As a general rule? No. But Fred used to work here - she knows this place well.'

Trish nodded her head, and her expression became wistful as she thought back to Fred's childhood in Texas. As a little girl, she had loved the community library in their town. Trish would pick her up there every afternoon after she had finished her rounds.

'A doctor - wow,' Cordelia sounded impressed, 'no wonder Fred's such a big brain.'

But Trish looked awkward. 'I drive the school bus,' she corrected.

Cordelia's eyes widened, as she took in her faux pas - and sought a way to smooth it over. 'Oh - well - I've never actually ridden in one of those - but I hear they're very nice.'

'A bus is a bus, dear, they do the job they're supposed to do - they don't have to be nice.'

'Uhuh.' Cordy bit her lip and twisted around to gaze across the library, awkwardly - unsure of what to say. She was relieved to see Doyle come into view, and waved him over. 'Did you find anything?' she asked. But he responded in the negative. He and Roger had swept all the lower floors - no sign of Fred.

'So what now?' her father demanded.

The younger couple exchanged a worried glance, '...um,'

'And come to think of it - what does Fred do for you people anyway? Seems kind of odd to me - a physicist working for a detective agency.'

'Well - Fred's ah… gone through some changes,' Cordelia told him.

'And who's fault is that?' He glared at the young woman - who stared back at him in alarm.

This man seemed to be getting frighteningly hostile - no wonder Fred had run off. Doyle stepped in to try and smooth the ruffled feathers. 'It's no one's fault, bud. We haven't known Fred that long, at all. She's been through a rough time these past few years - but that's her place to tell you - we met her, and we're looking out for her. Giving her a home. Keepin' her safe. I know you're worried, man, but we didn't take Fred away from y' and we didn't tell her to skip out on y' like this. This is her decision. And we're gonna find her. But she may not want to be found.'

'And why exactly is that?' Roger asked.

Doyle shrugged, 'you tell me.'

But that was exactly the wrong thing to say - and it only worked to rile Roger up further. 'And what the hell is that supposed to mean?' he asked, squaring up to the younger man and glowering down at him. 'You know in the great state of Texas - an insinuation like that would get your butt kicked. Now where the hell is my daughter?'

'Guys! guys!' Cordelia dragged Doyle out of Roger's way and stood between them, 'this isn't helping, OK? We just need a new idea.'

'And what do you suggest?' Roger still sounded affronted.

'Y'know - Gunn's taco stand idea is lookin' pretty good right about now,' Doyle muttered from his position hidden behind his girlfriend.

* * *

Wesley had started looking in the basement. Fred liked dank, dark places - so he searched every nook and cranny down there. But he found nothing. Next he checked the elevators - Cordy had found her hiding in there, crying, after her run in with a possessed Angel. But still no luck. He climbed the stairs all the way to the top, headed for the attics. The attics were a large, open space - but they were dark - and had sloping ceilings, so were reasonably cave like. Plus there was a whole load of junk in them - lots of objects to crawl under, lots of dust sheets to hide under. She could build herself a fort up there… Fred liked to build things.

He opened the door to the attic rooms and shone his flashlight inside. 'Fred? Are you in here? I'm all alone.. It's just you and me. You can come out if you want. Doyle and Cordy have taken your parents out of the hotel - they're across town by now. You don't have to come out if you don't want to … but just give me a sign if you're here.' There was nothing. He sighed. 'You know - I think I'm talking to myself...'

* * *

Doyle and Cordy were at a taco stand. Roger and Trish were looking less than impressed. 'Some detectives,' Trish muttered. 'They don't have any idea where Fred is.'

'Maybe they do - maybe they don't,' her husband replied. 'I think it's time to call them in...'

'Uhuh,' Cordelia was saying to guy that worked the counter, 'she's about my height but really thin. Long brown hair - big eyes - pretty. She would've bought a lot of tacos. No - huh?'

She turned back to the group, 'no luck, here - try another one?'

Mr and Mrs. Burkle exchanged a dark glance.'You know - that's it,' Roger snapped. 'I'm callin' the police.'

'Woah, man!' Doyle put his hands up, placating the older man, 'there's no need for that. She's just skipped out, is all - we'll find her.'

But Roger was done waiting. He didn't trust this man - or the rest of his team. Fred had disappeared - no word from her for years on end, then out of the blue she contacted her parents and then suddenly she was nowhere to be found? 'You are keepin' me from my daughter!' he accused.

'No - we're…'

'Nothin' is gonna get in the way of me finding my little girl.' He dug out his cell phone and began to dial. Cordelia and Doyle looked at each other, helplessly. Whatever was going to happen tonight - the police would only make things worse.

* * *

Fred sat in the bus station and clutched her ticket. She was sitting on the bench next to an elderly homeless man - and she was talking to herself the whole time, trying to give herself courage. She could do this. She could just get on the bus and become a whole new person - like origami. She would go to a brand new place, with no money and no friends and no job. Easy as pie, she told herself. '3.14159265,' she began to recite. The homeless man got up and moved away. 'Oh - hey - I was just calculating pi,' she called after him, 'to relax - I'm not dangerous!'

The creature crawled across the roof and peered down at the woman on the bench. But she didn't look up, she didn't see it - or even sense there was something wrong. She just continued stringing numbers together.

* * *

The Police had arrived - at the taco stand - and quite a crowd had gathered around the small group to watch - as Mr. Burkle accused Cordelia and Doyle of felony kidnap. 'Can you explain again how the two of you came to know Ms. Burkle?' The responding officer questioned them.

The young couple looked at each other again, hopelessly. 'We told you,' Cordelia said, 'we met her over the summer.'

'And where was that?'

Another anguished glance. 'She was - she was outside of the city - she was living in a forest.'

'She was sleeping rough?' the officer asked.

'Well - she had a cave,' Cordelia admitted.

'And how was her mental state?'

Doyle snorted, 'she was living all alone in a cave for five years - how d'y' think her mental state was? So we brought her back to the hotel. Gave her a home, helped her, like.'

'And so where is she now?'

'We don't know - hence with the looking!' Cordelia sounded exasperated.

'Hell - they say - they're hiding her from us!' Roger protested. A buzzing broke out amidst the group of onlookers, as the crowd weighed up the evidence and decided whether they believed Doyle and Cordy - or the Burkles.

The Police officer seemed to have made up their own mind, though - and it was not looking good for the two young demon hunters. 'I'm gonna have to ask the pair of you to accompany me down the station,' they said.

'We so don't have time for that!' Cordelia protested.

'Ma'am, if you won't accompany me willingly, I will have to arrest you.'

Excited muttering broke out amongst the crowd again.

'There's nothing else we can tell you,' Cordelia said, pushing her hair back from her face in frustration, 'we've told you everything we know.'

BAM the sudden onslaught of a vision slammed Doyle into the taco stand - and the cart went flying. Once again the crowd began to murmur in excitement. In his mind, he saw the images of Fred sitting at the bus station - and the creature watching her from above. 'Oh my gosh,' Cordelia breathed, as she watched her boyfriend spasm on the floor.

'What the hell's wrong with him?' Roger asked - sounding more furious than concerned.

'Epilepsy,' Cordelia replied, without missing a beat. 'Stress brings on seizures. My god - you're not helping Fred by having her only friends in the world sent to jail.'

The middle aged couple looked at each other, hesitation showing in their faces. 'We didn't mean to make the boy ill,' Trish said - staring down at Doyle, 'we just wanna find our daughter.'

'That's all we want too!'

'I know where she is!' Doyle came round - and found himself lying amongst the debris of the broken cart. Meat and fish and sauce and lettuce covered him and spattered the pavement. He could feel the crunching of broken taco shells beneath him. He struggled to is feet and tried to knock off the worst of the mess. 'We gotta go - I know where she is,' he said to Cordy.

But the police officer had other ideas. 'Sir, I can't allow you to leave. Now - if you've recovered from your - fit - I need you to accompany me to the police station.'

Doyle looked at the police officer - and made a split second decision. 'Sorry about this,' he said - and then morphed into his demon face and headbutted them right in the face. The officer lifted their hands too cover their head and staggered backwards. The crowd screamed, as they saw Doyle's green face and red eyes - and also began to fall back. Doyle grabbed his girlfriend by the hand - still demon face - and dragged her out of the crowd. 'C'mon,' he said, pulling her along after him. After a moment's indecision - Roger and Trish followed along after.

...

Doyle ran a couple of blocks, and then returned to his human face - and hailed a cab. The four of them bundled inside. 'Bus station,' the half demon barked at the driver, 'and step on it.' He then took out his cell to ring Wes and Angel.

'What the hell was that?' Roger asked.

'You mean his face?' Cordelia replied, 'special effect - from the monster movies.'

'Uhuh,' he was sounding less convinced with every lie she told. 'And how come he knows where Fred is, now.'

'Oh - that,' she forced a laugh. 'It's a detective thing. Sometimes he has a fit and when he comes out of it he just knows what's happening - like the information just clicks into place. He's one of those great, eccentric genius types of detective. Like Sherlock Holmes.' She smiled brightly at the flustered and confused Burkles.

* * *

Angel and Gunn were still creeping through the sewers. 'Fred?' the vampire called out, 'there's nothing to be afraid of!' Then they both jumped, as Angel's cell began to ring. He took it out and answered it, 'what?' He glanced at Gunn, and then spoke into his phone again, 'right - meet you there.' ' He snapped his phone shut, 'Doyle's had a vision, he knows where she is, come on.'

'Not the taco stand?'

'Not the taco stand.'

They turned back and walked the way they had come. A pair of blue eyes, now above them, on the ceiling of the tunnel, watched them go.

* * *

'I could go to Vegas,' Fred said to herself, 'learn to play blackjack, memorise four hundred and fifty two consecutive digits of pi - and a few hundred measly cards will be easy.'

Behind her, the reassembled gang hurried into the bus terminal, along with her parents, and approached one of the counters to speak to the clerk. They didn't see her and she didn't see them. Not at first. 'Nine, ten, Jack,' Fred was saying to herself, she looked over at the counter, 'Queen, King,' she realised who was standing there. 'No!'

Trish heard the cry, and turned around - just in time to see her daughter get up from the bench and start to scuttle away. 'Fred?' The whole team turned.

Everyone was looking at her - Angel, and Wesley, Cordy and the King of the monsters, and Gunn - and her parents… it couldn't be. 'No, you're not here! Go away!' she cried. She wished the others would look away, would go away - would take her parents with them.

But Trish was approaching her, tears glistened in her eyes. 'Fred, honey, it's us!'

But Fred began to shake her head. 'No you're not them, you can't be them - because they don't know!'

The team glanced at each other - they didn't understand what was happening, and whatever showdown they had expected, it wasn't this. Mr. and Mrs. Burkle were still moving towards Fred, who stood rooted to the spot. They moved carefully, as if afraid she would bolt - but for now she seemed frozen in place, as she desperately screwed her eyes shut and shook her head. 'Sweetie,' Roger said to her, his voice gentle, 'it's mom and dad.'

Fred's head shook harder, 'stop saying that!'

'Honey, don't you remember us?' Trish's voice trembled, heavy with tears.

Fred had begun to cry. 'I was - I was five years, and so lost, and at night I would ...I was all by myself and you weren't there.'

The team were still exchanging glances. It seemed they had miscalculated - misunderstood what was going on, what Fred's fear truly was.

'Fred, I don't understand,' Roger said, still inching towards her.

'I got lost. I got lost,' Fred sobbed, 'and they did terrible things to me, but, but it was just a storybook. It was just a story, with monsters, not real.' She continued to shake her head. 'Not in the world - but, but if you're here and you see me then - then it's real! And it did happen! If you see what they made of me … I didn't mean to get so lost.'

Trish was also crying now, the tears running freely down her face at her daughter's distress - but nevertheless, she was smiling. She took Fred's face in her hands, 'Oh honey, It doesn't matter what they did to you.' She wrapped her arms around her.

'Mommy,' sobbed Fred, cradled in her mother's arms.

'We're gonna make everything all right,' Trish promised, stroking Fred's hair.

'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry I got so lost.'

Roger wrapped his arms around his wife and daughter, so they stood huddled together - a family unit. 'It doesn't matter,' he said to Fred, 'you're our little girl.'

'I missed you so much,' she was still sobbing. 'I didn't mean to…' but her mother hushed her, it didn't matter now. They were together - that was all that would ever matter. They had found her.

'Everything's OK now,' Roger assured his family. 'You'll see, you're safe now.'

...

The creature dropped from the ceiling, screeching. It fell onto the small family, who broke apart. The whole gang stumbled backwards as they stared at the monster in the middle of the terminal. It was a giant insect - half way between a spider and a cockroach - and it screeched the whole time. Doyle pushed Cordelia behind himself, to protect her, and she stared out from behind him, in horror and disgust.

'Tell me that's something from the movies!' Roger said.

'No,' Cordelia answered, 'that's something that's gonna kill us.' All her best told lies, come to nothing …


	19. Fredless: Part Three

'Everybody outside,' Angel commanded, as the giant insect reared up at them, still screeching. Wesley tried to protest, but Angel was adamant - he could handle this.

The rest of the gang tumbled out of the door, taking Fred and her parents with them. They stood out, in the terminal, worrying. 'All of our weapons are back at the hotel!' Cordelia fretted.

Gunn shook his head, 'Angel said he could…'

The glass from the doors exploded outward, and Angel flew through them, rolling across the ground and landing in a heap at Gunn's feet.

'We might wanna rethink our strategy,' Doyle said, once more pushing Cordelia behind himself, as the huge bug came barrelling through the broken down doors.

Angel got back to his feet - his face vamped out - 'this is my strategy,' he launched himself back at the insect.

The gang backed away and, at Gunn's suggestion, scurried over to the car to see if there were any weapons stored there. 'What happened to his face?' Roger asked, as they ran.

'Angel's a vampire,' Wesley told him, 'he has a soul but it's a long story. I'll tell you all about it if we don't end up dying.' He caught sight of some luggage, piled up on the sidewalk and changed the plan, 'Cordelia,' he nodded at the bags.

Meanwhile, Angel was ducking and weaving, as the insect demon stabbed and sliced down at him with its pincers. The vampire was managing to avoid the worst of the blows, but he wasn't getting in any of his own. The hard exoskeleton of the demon meant that it was well protected, especially against an opponent with no weapons, and it was using its size to bear down on Angel, and force him into a corner.

'Oh, man we gotta do somethin',' Doyle groaned, twisting away from the luggage to watch, as his friend avoided another lethal jab. 'He's toast out there.' The insect took another swipe and, this time, knocked Angel to the ground.

'Yo bug boy!' Gunn shouted. He had found a compound sports bow in the luggage and fired an arrow at the insect. The demon reared back, shrieking, as the arrow pierced its armoured shell - but only for a moment - and seconds later it was back on top of the downed Angel. But then Wes and Cordy were there, hitting it with the golf clubs they had found. They had to keep moving to stay out of the way of its flailing limbs and jabbing pincers, but they seemed to be having an effect. It turned from Angel, and Doyle slid in under it to help his friend back to his feet. 'Y' OK, man?'

The vampire nodded, and winced, as he righted himself. Doyle handed him a golf club. 'It's the best we can do, right now,' he said. But Angel took it, without a word, and began to beat the insect with the club.

Gunn picked up a golf club of his own and joined in the fray. The demon wheeled around, shrieking, trying to get at all the team at once - the little gang of demon hunters just kept on swinging their clubs, hoping to beat it into submission. But the giant insect was too powerful. It swung one of its legs out, sending Doyle flying into Wesley. The two men tumbled to the ground, in a tangle of limbs, and Wes' golf club fell from his hand and slid across the floor, coming to a rest at Fred's feet.

Cordelia and Gunn closed ranks, moving to cover the space where their friends had been, and swinging their clubs faster to make up for the loss of Wesley's weapon. But it wasn't enough. The bug now had the room to move out into open ground, and it lashed out at Angel. The vampire was thrown through the air - again - and landed in a crumpled heap against the wheel of one of the parked buses. He struggled back up, but the bug was on top of him, already, and it used its pincers to skewer him through both shoulders, pinning him against the bus. He yelled out in pain, and his friends all winced in empathy.

...

Fred had been staring down at the golf club that Wesley had dropped right by her. _This was it,_ she thought. She could be in this fight. She could be in the team - for real. But, whilst the others had fought onward, and Doyle and Wesley had struggled to separate themselves out and get back to their feet, she had remained frozen - just staring at the club. _This was it_. But still, she just stared down, not making a move. Not until Angel screamed out, as the pincers of the beast pierced right through his shoulders. Hearing his pain, and realising his danger, she picked up the club and ran forward - swinging it with all her might against the hard shell of the bug. She felt something crack.

But her triumph was short lived, as the insect let go of Angel and turned on her, instead. The creature bore down on her and she stared up at it, open mouthed, not sure what to do. But the handsome man rescued her - again. The newly released vampire launched himself forward and pushed her out of the path of the rampaging demon. She just felt the tip of its pincer scratch her, as she was thrown out of its path - and registered the burning sensation in her arm that warned her of how much worse things could have been.

'That's my daughter you damn cockroach!' Roger smashed the bug over the head - and it shrieked out again. Angel jumped on top of it, and pinned it down - Doyle and Cordy came forward to circle the fight, their golf clubs raised. Roger led Fred out of the way and back onto the sidewalk.

The vampire and the demon wrestled - and the young couple swung their weapons at the bug whenever they could get a clear shot at it - but the insect was just too strong. Eventually, it threw Angel away from itself, once more throwing him against the parked bus. It pushed Doyle and Cordy out of the way, and then took a few steps towards the prone vampire.

BAM. A bus barrelled down the road and smashed straight into it. Purple gore streaked the windows, as the hard shell of the insect exploded in the impact. The brakes of the bus squealed, as the vehicle came screeching to halt. Then the doors opened. 'Did I get it?' Trish asked, standing in the doorway, and jumping up and down in excitement, 'did I get it, y'all?'

The team just gaped open mouthed at her.

* * *

Back at the Hyperion, Cordelia was sorting out everyone's injuries. She had cleaned Doyle and Wesley's cuts and scrapes, and sent her boyfriend off to make coffees, and now she was doctoring the scratch on Fred's arm - cleaning it and then tying a large bandage around it.

Trish sat beside them on the sofa, not wanting to move too far away from her daughter - even for a moment. She watched the adept way Cordelia dealt with the injury. 'I almost hate to ask,' she said, 'but - do you do a lot of bandaging in your line of work?'

'Occupational hazard,' Cordelia told her, as she fastened Fred's bandage tighter, 'I mean sure, there are the occasional demons that try to kill us with pillows - but they are few and far between.'

'We'd have all bled to death ten times over, if Cordy wasn't here to patch us up afterwards,' Doyle told Trish, as he returned with the coffees and handed her one, 'we couldn't manage a day without her.' He sounded proud - but that only made Cordelia snort, and shake her head at him.

'Chicken little, here, is the worst offender,' she told the Burkles. 'He's the only other person on the team, besides Angel, with supernatural powers but he still really _really_ can't handle himself in a fight. Nine times out of ten - it's him I'm patching up.'

'I handle myself just fine,' he protested.

'What happened to - "you would have bled to death ten times over without me"?' she asked, sticking her tongue out at him.

'Well, maybe I only take such big risks because I know I've got you to play nurse for me, afterwards,' he winked at her.

Trish smiled at them both, 'so you two are an item? How come you didn't go for the big, strapping hunk of hero - Angel?' she asked Cordelia.

Cordy threw back her head and laughed, 'good god - so many reasons!'

'And you've got powers, too, son?' Roger asked, looking at Doyle, 'not a vampire, though - not with that green skin?'

'Nope,' Doyle shook his head, 'demon - well, half - I'm human on my mother's side. I get visions o' people in trouble. Then the big strappin' hunk o' hero rescues them - and then Cordelia patches us up.'

'And sometimes we even get paid!' Cordelia added. 'As business models go … we're pretty much always in the red. He really should have more visions - of rich people.'

'So, that's what that fit was? Did you ever have a vision of our Fred in trouble? Besides tonight, I mean?' Roger wanted to know.

'Yep… but five years too late.' He glanced towards the woman getting bandaged, 'sorry about that, darlin'.' She smiled, shyly, but then looked away from him. Doyle noticed - and turned back to Roger without commenting, 'still, Angel was able to save her in the end… and now here we are.'

'Here we are,' Fred echoed, in a small voice.

Roger turned away from the group, and went to examine the severed Durslar head. It was covered in goopy purple crystals - and he was careful not to touch them as he picked the head up. 'What about this guy?' he asked, 'was he a demon?'

'I think Angel called it a Durslar beast,' Cordelia said, glancing round.

Doyle stood up to get a better look at it, as Roger brought it over to them. 'They're more like monsters than demons - animals, y'know… they can't talk or think,'

'Kinda like you, huh?' Cordelia asked. Doyle just gave her a look, and she giggled.

'I don't know why it attacked them, though,' the half demon continued, as if he hadn't been insulted, 'they usually just hang out in sewer tunnels. Not known for going to bright places and committing acts of - ah - unsociable behaviour.'

'Oh - so nothing like you, then,' Cordelia said - he gave her another dark look. She laughed at him again, until his expression cracked and he, too, began to smile.

Fred was scrutinising the head, she poked at the crystals with her finger - and frowned.

'Angel and Fred tracked it after it attacked them when they went out for ice cream,' Cordelia told the Burkles.

Both of them looked impressed. 'Fred, do you know how to track these things?' Roger asked.

'No.' she admitted. She smiled, but it was hesitant - and a little sad. 'I was mostly there for the ice cream.'

Trish frowned at the head in her husband's hands. She wished they would put it away - it gave her the willies. But Roger disagreed, 'Oh don't be silly, Trish, it's just a severed head.'

They were reacting very well to the discovery of vampires and demons living amongst them - in all her years in the good fight, Cordelia had never seen anyone take the news so calmly. Of course, she, herself, had bitten a vampire in order to make it back off during the first apocalypse she ever took part in… but that was following months of denial and repressing memories. But these guys… they were taking it completely in their stride - and taking an interest. Though it was probably because they had found Fred, after all these years; and nothing, absolutely nothing, was going to put a dent in their happiness. World War Three could break out that very night - and they would still be happy. Though Trish really didn't like the severed Durslar head.

But Gunn was suddenly there to take it away. He shook his head and chuckled a little, as he took it off Roger's hands, 'the lady makes bug soup with a ten ton bus, but show her a paper mache head and she gets the willies. Ha! Women.' Still shaking his head, he put the severed head down on the counter top, resting his hands on top of it.

Angel leaned in to whisper to him. 'You do know it's not paper-mache?'

The street fighter immediately removed his hands from the head, and stared down at them in disgust. 'We still got that bleach in the bathroom?' He ran off to go and clean his hands. Wesley and Angel laughed, and then turned to look at the family group over on the sofa. Trish and Roger were fussing over Fred, who was grinning, as she enjoyed their fussing.

'I gotta say - this isn't how I saw this turning out,' Angel said.

'They look happy don't they?' Wesley agreed.

...

Over on the sofa, Cordelia was done bandaging. 'Voila!' she pronounced. 'I think that's French for "we stopped the bleeding".' Fred thanked her, and moved out of the way. 'Next up, multiple stab wounds. Angel!'

The vampire jumped off his stool and hurried over to the sofa, 'Oh it's my turn, Yay!' He settled himself down next to the first aider and grinned at her, expectantly.

She chuckled. 'What a dork,' she said, fondly. Sat on her other side, Doyle glanced over and gave Angel an odd look - then he took his playing cards out of his pocket and began to shuffle them, carefully not watching, as Cordelia stripped the shirt off the muscular vampire and set to work on his injuries.

...

Fred walked over to stand by Wesley, he smiled down at her, raking his eyes over her bandage, and asked her how it felt. 'Like my heart's been put through one of those orange juice squeezers,' then she glanced down at her arm and realised - '...oh, kinda like a giant bug tried to rip my arm off and Angel saved me.'

'He seems to do _that_ a lot,' Trish observed. She and Roger had followed Fred over to the counter - not wanting to be away from her side for more than a moment. Fred smiled - and looked across at the room at the handsome man being bandaged up by Cordelia. He was always saving people - and Cordy was always there with him, to make sure everything was OK afterwards. It was like Cordelia had said - their business model: the vision, Angel saving people, Cordelia making everything better again - the way the team worked. 'It's what he does,' she told her mother, 'Angel's the champion,' her smile took on a dreamy quality as she said it, but there was a sadness too - a bittersweet smile, as she contemplated the man who could have everything but love.

Then she smiled up at Wesley - this smile admiring. 'And Wesley's the brains of the operation.' Gunn came out of the bathroom, having thoroughly bleached his hands, 'and Gunn's the muscle,' she continued, turning her smile on the street fighter. She glanced back at the group on the sofa, and nodded at Doyle, who was still playing with his cards, 'Doyle's the eyes and ears of the group… and Cordelia,' she looked at the way the other woman gently applied the bandage to Angel's shoulder and smoothed it down, 'is the heart.' Cordelia turned and smiled at her for saying something so sweet. 'And I'm ...I'm …' Fred frowned to herself, and her words trailed off.

'And to think we went and called the cops on a bunch of superheroes!' Roger cut in, shaking his head in disbelief and grinning. 'I sure am sorry about that,' he added to Cordy and Doyle. 'I guess it would have made Angel's job much harder to have this place crawlin' with police - asking him what he's up to, when he's just trying to save the day.' Fred was still frowning to herself, staring down at the floor.

'Oh I'm not really a hero,' Angel protested.

Cordelia snorted at his faux modesty, but Gunn was willing to agree, 'more like a blood sucking fiend,' he said.

Angel threw him a dark look, and then turned that look on Doyle, when the half demon began to chuckle. 'Hey!'

'Frankly, Angel,' Roger said to him, 'I don't care if you drink pig's blood, cow's blood or them fruity imported beers, you saved my little girl.'

'Well I wouldn't have had to if she hadn't gone all Amazonian and whacked the thing with a golf club.'

Roger began to chuckle - he hadn't seen a stroke like that since Nicklaus took on Gary Player in the 1963 -

'Bob Hope desert classic!' Angel finished the sentence. They both nodded and laughed, and then shook hands.

Cordelia shook her head, 'can you believe these guys?' she muttered to Doyle.

He smiled back, ' _old people!'_ he whispered.

'I heard that,' Angel told them.

'You were meant to,' Doyle replied.

'Hey!' The vampire was protesting again.

...

'I wanna go home.' Fred's voice cut through the chatter in the lobby. And everyone fell silent, and looked at her. Doyle pocketed his playing cards and Cordelia stopped tidying the first aid kit. The other woman looked around at everyone, and tried to explain. 'I'm - I'm just not cut out for this. I mean, if Angel hadn't gotten me out of the way - you'd all be laughing in the morgue right now. OK, maybe not laughing, but the point is - I think I should go home, where it's quiet and safe, and monsters don't try and eat your family.' She looked at her parents, her face uncertain, 'you're not disappointed in me, are you?'

'Oh, honey, never!' Tears had welled up in Trish's eyes again, 'it's gonna be so good to have you home!' she and Roger converged on Fred, and the small family stood, hugging. Fred closed her eyes, and squeezed her parents tightly - after all these years, finally everything was going to be OK - she was home again.

...

Wesley and Gunn stood next to each other - they were smiling, for Fred, for appearances sake - but neither of them seemed happy. Their eyes were clouded, as they looked at the embracing little group. 'She'll probably be happier there,' Gunn said - keeping his voice even.

Wesley never took his eyes off the little woman in the middle of the group hug, 'yeah - that's good.'

* * *

Fred stood in her room, looking at all the writing she had scribed on the walls. There was a knock on the door and she turned to look - it was Angel. She invited him in - not that he needed the invite anymore, she had given that out as soon as he had returned from his retreat in Tibet - but she wouldn't be inviting him anywhere anymore so she wanted to do it this one last time.

'How are you doing?' he asked her.

Where to start? Fizzy, that was one feeling, weird and fizzy. Excited. But sad as well. But with a hefty dollop of thankful thrown in for good measure. Cautiously happy. Relieved and worried at the same time. A little bit nauseous, but still hopeful.

Angel looked a little dazed by the end of her speech. 'And that about covers it,' he said. He looked at the walls - remembering the frantic way she had scribbled everything down back in the beginning. 'Will you remember all this?' he asked.

'Well sure,' she told him, 'it's a story, see. Once upon a time there was a girl - who lived all alone in a horrible cave, and she was so far from home it made her chest hurt. And every day, in that horrible cave, the girl tried to figure out a way to escape. None of her plans ever succeeded, of course - and she'd almost given up hoping - but then one day, a handsome man rode up on his horse and saved her - and took her back to live at his castle... Now you'd think that would be the end wouldn'tcha? Dumb old fairy tales and their happily ever afters.'

She went to go sit on the bed, and after a moment Angel followed her. 'But you see,' Fred told him, 'the moment they got back to his castle - the handsome man went away again. And even though she didn't mean to - didn't want to - high up in that castle, the girl just built herself another cave. Hoping that he would save her again.' She looked directly at him, 'but you can't save me this time, can you?'

Angel stayed silent, and Fred looked down at her hands.

* * *

Doyle and Cordelia sat on the sofa, watching the group across the lobby admire the - thing - that Fred had been building. After a moment, the Irishman turned away from the group and looked at Cordelia instead, 'you OK?' he asked her.

'Me? I'm fine - why wouldn't I be?'

He shrugged. 'I dunno - 'cause Fred's goin' home - and you haven't got a home to go to?'

But that only made her roll her eyes. 'Fred is going home to be _safe_ ,' she told him. 'My home, on the other hand, is Sunnydale - welcome to the hellmouth! If I returned to _my_ hometown I would be increasing my likelihood of an early death by about ninety percent. There's just no comparison. Besides,' she kissed him, 'my home is wherever you are, now - doesn't matter where we actually _are_.'

'Yeah?'

'Yeah… are you OK?'

'Me? I'm fine.'

'Yeah? You're not getting all misty eyed about the Emerald Isle now that Fred's going back to her home?'

'Nah,' he shook his head and smiled, 'home is where the heart is, right - and Fred said it - you're the heart of our outfit.'

...

'It's cool aint it?' Gunn said, showing Fred's parents the features he could work out on her contraption.

'We think it's some sort of mechanised weapon,' Wesley told them, 'possibly influenced by the medieval catapult, designed for serious to fatal wounding. If not outright decapitation.'

'Or it makes toast,' Roger said. They all laughed.

A noise on the stairs alerted them all to the presence of Fred. 'You got everything packed, baby?' Trish asked, 'what about that shirt with the bug guts on it? You threw that out right?' But Fred shook her head, she was taking it home as a souvenir of her time with AI.

Cordelia and Doyle got to their feet, to see her off, and Fred looked at where the gang stood. She seemed shy, all of a sudden. 'You know, in the shower I had all these pretty things I was gonna say - I was gonna be all fancy but… aw heck.' She went up to Gunn and gave him a big hug.

He held onto her tightly for a moment, and then cleared his throat. 'Come back and visit - we'll get tacos,' he said to her, his voice sounded thick. Then he let her go.

She went to Wesley, and the pair of them danced around awkwardly, not knowing where to put their arms - but at last they got it right, and managed a hug. Doyle was next, and Fred was unsure. She had always avoided him as much as possible, he had always made her uncomfortable - the King of all the monsters in Pylea. It didn't feel right to hug him, she didn't want to, but she didn't want to look mean. But Doyle had already thought through all that. His cards were in his hands, and he was shuffling away - so he wasn't free to hug her. Instead, he just winked at her, and smiled. 'You just be happy, yeah, darlin'?'

She nodded, and moved onto Cordelia. 'Between you and me, I'm a little jealous,' Cordelia whispered, as she wrapped her arms around Fred. She held the other woman tightly for a brief moment, and then let go.

Finally, Fred approached Angel. He handed her her suitcase. She thanked him - for everything - and he said goodbye. Then she left him and went to her parents. The Burkle family walked out of the door, and Angel's family stood still and watched them go. Fred turned back to wave, just before the doors closed behind her - and then she was gone. The team all looked at each other - unsure of what to say.

The hotel felt unimaginably empty.

* * *

Fred and her parents got in the taxi, headed for the airport. Fred was squashed in the middle, and her parents kept their arms around her the whole time as they chatted about what they would do back in Texas. As the conversation lulled, Fred leaned forward and opened her bag, 'I'm just gonna miss 'em is all,' she said, taking out her gore splattered shirt, as she fretted about the family she was leaving behind.

She frowned. The purple bug guts had dried out - and turned into pretty crystals, the same as she had admired on the walls of the sewer much earlier in the evening. The same as the ones she had prodded on the head of the Durslar beast just a couple of hours ago. The information whirred through her brain, as she analysed the data and reached a conclusion. Everything clicked into place. 'Turn the car around,' she yelled, 'now!'

* * *

The team were back inside Wesley's office, sprawled out in the chairs - feeling sorry for themselves. 'In a really weird way, you know who I miss?' Cordelia asked.

'Fred.' Wesley said.

'Actually, I was gonna say her parents.'

'Even though they called the cops on us?' Doyle asked, 'I head butted that police officer pretty hard - I may be a wanted man right now.'

'Pfft,' Cordy snorted, 'so you're in trouble with the law - what's new? But after the near arrest, and the mind numbing terror of the bug attacks… everything seemed so cosy when Mr. and Mrs. Burkle were here - and now they're gone, the whole place feels empty without them and I miss them. Is that wrong?'

Angel shook his head. Trish and Roger had been very nice. But Cordelia didn't think 'nice' cut it as a descriptor. They were more than nice. They had been like..

'Parents,' Gunn said, nodding - his tone implying everything that that word was meant to mean. The team all nodded their heads - understanding exactly what it was that Trish and Roger provided, what it was they were missing out on themselves.

'They loved her,' Wesley said, thinking of the way the Burkles had treated Fred - and comparing that to his own experiences. 'Supported her - didn't grind her down into a tiny self conscious nub with their constant berating. Their never ending tirade of debasement and scorn and…' he trailed off when he saw the others staring at him.

'Y'know - I think I should call my mam, see how she's doin',' Doyle said, he looked at his watch, 'what time is it in Ireland right now?'

'Greenwich Mean Time is Pacific Standard Time plus eight,' Wesley told him, also looking at his watch, as he calculated the time difference, 'maybe leave it a few more hours?' Doyle nodded. He'd ring her first thing in the morning - her first thing - his last thing at night.

'At least Fred's got a shot at a normal life, now,' Cordelia said. 'Not that I don't love you guys, and L.A, and my work - but things are just never normal around here, you know?' The men all nodded in agreement.

* * *

Out in the lobby, the skin of the Durslar beast's head began to ripple and bulge - as if something was moving beneath it...


	20. Fredless: Part Four

'She was so smart,' Wesley said, smiling to himself as he reflected on Fred.

Angel was equally reflective. 'I'm gonna miss her,' he admitted, 'she was just this nice, quiet - kind of crazy. I found that - soothing.'

'And what, I'm not soothing?' Cordelia asked. She sat up straight, 'I can be soothing,' she told the men, she leaned in towards Angel, 'I could soothe your ass off, pal.' Angel's face went blank, as Cordelia was talking to him; and, slumped in his chair, Doyle noticed the way that the vampire seemed to shut down - to show no reaction.

'I've always considered myself to be a rather soothin' presence, I must say,' he said, wriggling upright, 'patient, calm - I roll with the punches… yep, pretty good at soothin', myself.'

Cordelia arched an eyebrow at him, 'Soothing yourself? What's _that_ a euphemism for?' then she shrugged, 'you do give a pretty mean neck rub.'

Her boyfriend flexed his fingers, 'that I do.'

'She was pretty handy with a five iron, as well,' Gunn said, still thinking of Fred. He and Wesley shared a look, and laughed, as they remembered the tiny little woman going up alone against the monstrous bug.

* * *

Out in the lobby, the Durslar head was beginning to bubble like crazy, as more and more little _somethings_ moved beneath its skin. A giant bug, just like the one from the bus terminal, was staring in at the window. The team, locked in their reverie about Fred, did not notice.

* * *

Cordelia sighed, and heaved herself to her feet. 'Well I'm not gonna sit around and mope like you bunch of - mopers.' She put her shoes back on. 'I'm going home, to eat comfort food and have a good cry.' She looked across at Doyle, 'come with me and give me a soothing neck rub?'

'My pleasure, Princess,' he too got to his feet and pulled on his jacket. Saying goodbye to the others, he wrapped his arm around Cordelia and the pair of them walked to the office door. 'And when we're done… I'm gonna crawl right under my big, fluffy…' Cordelia was saying, she stepped through into the lobby - and the pair of them froze up in terror, 'giant bug!' she finished, staring up at the insect that was coming through the front door. She screamed, and Doyle pushed her back into the office, just as the other men came rushing out.

'We hit that thing with a bus!' Gunn said, staring in disbelief, 'you tellin' me that a bus won't kill it?'

'I don't think it's the same one,' Angel said. He peered out into the courtyard and saw that the place was now crawling with the giant insects - scores of them all making their way towards the hotel.

'We are so immensely dead,' Cordelia stated - still just staring at the oncoming bug from over Doyle's shoulder.

In front of her, Doyle morphed into his spikes. 'We've faced better odds,' he said to her, 'but maybe we can just run away really fast?'

'They keep tracking us,' Wesley said, 'the bus station, here… we can't run - we need to fight.'

'Then we'll die,' Doyle replied. Cordelia gripped hold of him harder, her fingers pinching into his shoulders.

'Weapons,' Wesley commanded. As the group ran to the open weapons cabinet, Angel rolled across the counter and started to fight the first bug. But as with the last one, this bug just threw the vampire to the ground. Wesley rounded on the insect, his sword raised. 'Angel, we need…'

'Here, I'm here!' the door to the hotel had opened and Fred came running inside, breathless.

'Fred?'

She looked around at the swarming insects, 'oh I'm late!' She and Roger dragged her contraption to over by the door, and she fiddled with it to get it ready.

...

Cordelia and Doyle swung their axes at one insect, having to keep moving as it bore down on them. They didn't manage to connect, as its pincers kept them at bay. It lashed out and sent Doyle crashing to the ground. He landed in a crumpled heap, groaning in pain - glad he wore his demon face to better absorb the blow. Cordelia stared up in horror, as the insect came for her. She swung her axe one last time - and missed. It jabbed down with its pincers, and she closed her eyes waiting for the death blow. But then she was swept off her feet and she too crashed to the floor. Doyle had got back up, and rugby tackled her to the ground, to get her out of the bug's way. They lay very still, Doyle protecting Cordelia with his body, as the insect reared up and clacked it's pincers together, making a horrible snickering sound.

'We're just gonna play dead for a moment,' the half demon whispered into his girlfriend's ear. The bug began to back away from them, turning to the rest of the fight - and once its back was turned, the couple scrambled to their feet and grabbed their weapons, once more.

...

Angel was still pinned down by the first bug - it was jabbing away at him, and Wesley and Gunn were working to block its pincers and stop it from stabbing their friend. As the second bug bore down from them, Angel glanced around, frantically. 'Who's helping me here?'

...

'I am!' over by the door, Fred had got her contraption ready. She stomped down, hard, on it and the battle axe sailed through the air. But instead of hitting one of the insects going in for the kill, it smashed down on the counter, splitting the Durslar head in two, like an overripe melon. Green blood splattered against the walls - and a whole host of baby cockroach looking things came swarming out. Cordelia shuddered, and dove back behind Doyle - though he was looking none too comfortable with this turn of events, himself. Gunn backed away, as well.

But the giant insects stopped trying to kill the gang, and instead turned their backs on them and made their way to cockroach infested head. The first insect picked up the head - made a snickering noise - which might have been thanks - and then left the hotel, taking all the others with it. The gang all breathed a sigh of relief.

'It did take all the baby cockroaches, right?' Doyle asked looking around, 'there aren't any left over?' he backed further away from the counter as he spoke.

'So - not a toaster?' Gunn said, looking from the contraption to the battle axe buried in the woodwork of the counter.

Angel was looking bemused, 'Fred how did you...?'

'The crystals,' she interrupted, 'the ones we saw in the sewer. They were on the Durslar head too, and at first I thought they came from him, until I saw this - daddy?' she reached out and Roger handed her the shirt she had been wearing at the bus terminal. She held it up so the others could look at it, displaying the same purple crystals to them. 'Those crystals are just dried up bug goop,' she said. Her words were tumbling out of her mouth, fast and her sentences ran on - as she tried to get all the information out. 'It must have laid its eggs in the Durslar's head, which would explain the Durslar coming up out of the sewer, 'cause I mean, wouldn't you be a little crazy if you had eggs in your head? I know I would.'

Cordelia opened her mouth, but then she glanced across at Angel - who shook his head at her, ever so slightly, and she closed it again.

'Anyway - that'd be all fine and Darwinian,' Fred was saying, 'except Angel killed the Durslar and brought the head back here. So the bug had to track it down to get its babies back.'

Wesley was nodding along, looking very impressed as he drew his own conclusions, 'and at the bus station, when Trish ran over the mother...'

'Or father,' Fred corrected, 'I think it might be a hive species, gender neutral - but I'd have to do some research to back that up.'

'The whole hive showed up in order to reclaim its offspring,' Wesley finished. Fred nodded, and the watcher's face lit up in a brilliant smile. 'Brilliant deduction Fred.'

'Not to mention, that little axe gadget is tight!' Gunn told her, sounding equally impressed.

Fred blushed. It was just a thought she had had - what if you were to lose both your arms in battle? You'd haemorrhage to death quite quickly, of course, but with her axe catapult you could take your enemy with you.

'Nice going, Fred,' Angel smiled at her.

'Aw - it was nothin',' she blushed even deeper, 'just a stunning revelation of my true path in life, that's all.' Then she turned to her parents, looking apologetic - she could go home with them, and pretend the past five years hadn't happened, and that everything was back to normal - but the truth was: she wasn't normal anymore. She had missed them both so much, when she was gone, but her place was here now - in L.A. She suddenly turned back to the others and looked anxious, 'Unless it's not? I'd understand if y'all didn't want to put up with me…'

'Let's put it to the vote shall we?' Wesley asked quickly. 'All in favour say "aye". Aye.' He raised his hand, 'motion passed, good. You're staying.' Fred beamed at him, and the rest of the team all smiled at each other.

Trish's eyes blurred with tears, she knew this was where Fred belonged - but a part of her had hoped her daughter wouldn't figure that out until it was too late. But still, she and Roger would be staying around for a while - to get to know Fred again, and to make sure she was one hundred percent happy with her decision. Fred smiled as she looked around the lobby, 'Oh - I think I know where I'll end up.'

* * *

The hotel was quiet. Cordelia had found some spare linens, and she and Fred had made up a room for Trish and Roger to stay in. They had finally turned in for the night, and Fred was alone in her room. She lay in the darkness, thinking to herself. This room had become her cave - her place to hide after she had returned from Pylea. It couldn't be that anymore. She had faced her demons - and found her way back to the world, and now she was ready to start her life anew - here, with the team.

She closed her eyes and in her mind's eye she could see all the writing she had done on the walls, the crazed, frantic scribblings - trying to find order in her disorganised mind. She knew the story now - and she understand why it didn't have an ending. Not because fairy tales couldn't be real - but because her story wasn't over. She wasn't closing the book up for good, she was simply starting a new chapter. A better chapter - a brighter one, with a world of possibilities.

She thought of her parents lying close by. It made her chest hurt to know they were there - but in a good way, in a happy way. She thought of all those nights in her cave, back in Pylea, how she would curl up and cry to herself for her parents, at her longing for their warmth and safety - and at the thought of what they were going through, not knowing where she was.

It was that that had made her sneak from the hotel and send them a letter. They needed to know she was alive, even if she wasn't their Fred anymore. But, as much as she had yearned for them whilst she was away, once she was back she wasn't able to face the thought of them. She was a different person now, after everything she'd been through. And it was easy to be that person amongst people who had never known the real Fred. She could pretend there was no real Fred, that she hadn't lost herself. She couldn't do that in front of her parents.

But they had found her anyway. She had got lost - and they had found her. And as she drifted off to sleep, she finally heard it. That click. The click in her brain where everything made sense again. She was home. For real this time.

* * *

Gunn hit the burrito stand before he headed home. This was good, he thought to himself. Fred was staying after all, he was glad. She was cool - and he was happy she would be around. He hadn't realised how much he had got used to her being there until it seemed like she was gone… and he hadn't realised how much a part of their family she had become until she was leaving them. But now she was staying - and he had more time with her. And that was definitely cool.

* * *

Wesley locked his front door and poured himself a scotch. He hadn't even switched the lights on. He just sat in the dark, holding his drink. His hand trembled ever so slightly, he glanced down at it, and then took a gulp from the tumbler, feeling the pleasant burning sensation as the scotch travelled down his throat.

When it seemed that Fred would be leaving them… he hadn't been prepared for that. He hadn't been prepared for the way it felt, watching her be happy as she moved on to a life without… the team. The thought of her going - the loss of her - those minutes in the office when he believed she was gone forever, no - he hadn't been prepared for the way that had made him feel.

But then she had come back. And he hadn't been prepared for the way he felt when she re-appeared in the doorway, or for the relief - and gladness - when she announced her intention to stay. She was one of them, now. One of the family. Part of the furniture. He took another swig of his drink. His hand still trembled, so he poured himself another glassful - and tossed it all straight back.

* * *

'So all's well that ends well,' Doyle said to Cordelia, as the pair of them walked back to her place, hand in hand.

'As you like it,' she replied. He gave her a confused glance, 'what?' She smiled at him, a teasing smile, 'Oh - I thought we were naming Shakespeare plays… you were really just saying that tired old phrase for real, huh?'

'Uh...yeah. I just meant, it was a good result tonight, you know?'

'Well we're not giant bug food, that's always a plus.' She shuddered, 'I hate it when insects try to eat me.'

'Can't say I blame y'... they were nasty lookin' critters. Still - I mean it's good that Fred's happy, and that she's stayin'.'

They arrived at Cordy's front door, and Cordelia took her key out and unlocked it. 'Yeah - I'm glad we get to keep her,' she smiled, 'I would have really missed crazy, taco lady if she'd gone… and maybe - now she's staying - she can get over that weird hatred she has for you.'

'It is weird, right? I'm completely loveable!'

'Totally,' she kissed him, and they went inside. Phantom Dennis switched on the lights, and there was the sound of the kettle boiling on the stove. Cordelia sat on the sofa, and started to take her shoes off, 'I wonder why she does dislike you so much?'

The Irishman shrugged. 'Obviously she's impervious to my ample charms… but I'll win her over - I won you over didn't I?'

'No,' she stuck her tongue out at him.

And he laughed. 'Oh - I wore you down, good, Princess. You went from not even giving me the time o' day to doing unspeakable things with me that you can't tell your mother about.' He waggled his eyebrows at her in a devilish way to try and convey his meaning.

'My mother has always been very prudish when it comes to shoulder rubs,' Cordelia agreed, 'speaking of which - I believe one was promised?' She leaned back against him, and he smiled as he began to knead her neck and shoulders. She closed her eyes, 'mmm - that feels good.'

'Yeah? What about this?' he pressed further down, and she moaned again.

'Even better,' she whispered.

Two mugs of tea floated over and settled down on the coffee table. Doyle continued the massage for a few more minutes. Once Cordelia had gone completely quiet and still, he spoke to again. 'Cordelia? Have you noticed Angel acting… oddly - around you at all, lately?'

'What's that?' she opened one bleary eye.

'Angel - have you noticed him being weird?'

'He's always weird. I don't wanna think about him right now. He kills my buzz.'

'Good.' Still sitting behind her, massaging, Doyle leaned round to kiss her on her left temple. 'But I've just been thinkin' that he's treatin' you … differently, as of late.'

She opened both eyes. 'Did you get me all relaxed so that you could tell me he's turning back into _Angelus?_ ' she demanded, her voice rising in panic towards the end of her sentence.

'No - I don't think the dark avenger is turning evil, as such.'

'Well, good,' she settled back down again and closed her eyes once more, 'then we have nothing to worry about.'

'Maybe.' But behind her, Doyle still looked thoughtful.

After another ten minutes rubbing, Cordelia took her tea and went into the bedroom. 'You coming?' she asked him, but he shook his head.

'There's somethin' I wanna do first,' he told her.

'OK - but come to bed quietly, I'm beat - I will not be impressed if you wake me up.'

'Sure thing, Princess.' He waited until her bedroom door was closed, and then he picked up the phone and dialled the long number for an international phone call. He listened to it ring, imagining it at the other end - a whole world away; the little kitchen the phone stood in, on the kitchen counter - just underneath the clock with the knife and fork for hands, in the little terraced house in the north side of Dublin. He wondered what the weather was like there, today - probably overcast, maybe raining.

After a few rings, the phone was picked up. 'Hey ma,' he said, 'it's me.' He smiled warmly, as he listened to her delighted greeting. 'Yeah I'm fine, ma ...you?' He closed his eyes, a contented smile still playing across his face, as he listened to his mother launch into the details of exactly what everyone he had ever met had been up to since the last time he'd spoken to her.

* * *

Angel lay up in his penthouse suite, the lights switched off - but he wasn't sleeping. He was glad Fred was staying with them and all, of course he was. But it wasn't the Texan woman that he thought of, as he stared at the ceiling and chased sleep, with no success...

* * *

The team were all inside Fred's room - alongside her parents, decorating. She wanted to banish any memory of the cave she had created when she first returned home - and getting rid of her writing was a big part of that. She didn't need it anymore. Everything made sense now - she was the real Fred again.

Roger and Angel were discussing demons, as they worked, or at least they were discussing famous people that they suspected were demons. 'Now Spiro Agnew,' Roger said, 'I _know_ he was..'

'A grathnar demon, right,' Angel smiled, in disbelief that someone else, after all this time, could see what was so plainly obvious. 'You knew that? I thought I was the only one who knew that!'

'What else could he be, but a demon?' Roger shrugged.

Working beside them, Doyle wrinkled his face up in confusion. 'What the hell is "Spiral Agnew"?' he asked, 'is it like Spinal Tap?' Roger and Angel shared an incredulous look, and shrugged their shoulders _\- kids!_

_..._

Wesley walked in carrying a tin of paint. He stopped by where Gunn was painting and watched him for a few moments. Then he couldn't contain himself any longer. 'Not horizontally,' he said, his voice exasperated, 'vertically - otherwise you..'

'Look I'm telling you,' Gunn interrupted, still working his paint roller sideways, 'you do it vertically, you're gonna get them ugly drops.' Wesley opened his mouth to argue - but Trish intervened.

She stood between them, roller raised, and looked at them both in turn. 'Now boys, I don't wanna hear anymore fighting over here, you understand?'

The two men looked sheepish, 'OK' they chorused in unison. She smiled, and returned to her painting, and Gunn did likewise. Wesley picked up a roller of his own and joined in.

...

Cordelia walked into the room, then, carrying two pizza boxes. 'Did someone here order a pizza?' she asked.

Doyle put his hand up, 'over here, Princess, gimme a slice.' she walked over to him, opening the first box. He looked down into it, and then at his hands. 'I'm all painty, feed it to me?' She rolled her eyes, and held up a slice for him to take a bite. Angel turned his back on them, and began to paint more vigorously. Doyle watched him.

'Anyone else want a slice of pizza whilst it's fresh?' Cordelia asked the rest of the room, once he was finished eating. 'Fred? Pizza?'

'In a minute,' Fred said, twisting to look at her. She was working on a separate section of the wall - all by herself. 'I just wanna get this last bit done.' She turned back to look at the drawing she had put up there, one of the first things she had scribbled on the wall after Angel had brought her back to the hotel - and then promptly left again. The picture that depicted the defining moment. Her rescue - her salvation - her fairy tale. It was a stick figure of a horse, with two riders. A man in front, and a woman holding onto him, behind.

She remembered that moment. The swinging of the crebbil - and their daring escape, bounding across the countryside on horseback - until they thought they were safe, and came to a stop near her cave. _Handsome man saved me from the monsters._ And he had. He had saved her life. But that was all Angel could do for her - the rest she needed to do for herself. And, after a moment of staring, of letting go and saying goodbye, she raised her paint roller and painted right over the picture - blotting out the fairy tale ending for good.


	21. Billy: Part One

Down in the basement, Angel leaned into Cordelia from behind, wrapping his arms around her. He felt her body tense. 'Don't stiffen up,' he advised.

'Yeah, you either,' she retorted.

Perched on a table in the corner, where he was watching them, Doyle rolled his eyes. 'That's disgustin', Cordelia,' he said.

She snickered. 'I thought it was funny.' She raised her sword and began to go through the series of movements Angel had taught her - he stayed behind her the whole way, guiding her through the steps. He was hyper aware of her warmth, and her scent, and her closeness. It filled his head and made him feel dizzy. But he was also aware of her boyfriend, sitting in the corner, enjoying the show.

Doyle was watching her closely, his eyes admiring and appreciative, she was very graceful with a blade - and she was following the steps Angel had shown her without hesitation; never stumbling, or uncertain - it was like she was performing a dance… but whilst holding a giant sword.

'Alright,' Angel said, taking a step away from her so he could also watch her appreciatively, 'a good defence is about moving the line of attack. When the bad guy comes at you, you want to step off the line.' He used his hands to guide her into a turn, so she was facing him, 'like this,' he jumped backwards to avoid the sharp end of the blade now pointing at him. 'Creating a new one. Every time you do, your opponent will be forced to adjust. Always make the other guy work.'

'Okay,' she said, lowering her sword and looking expectant. 'Move the line - then what?'

Angel picked up a sword of his own, he didn't quite meet her eye as he spoke. 'Then,' he swung the sword, and she parried it, before moving again, 'just keeping moving the line.' They repeated the same motions. 'You'll be able to keep any attacker busy until.. You know...'

Doyle raised his eyebrows at that, and Cordelia looked less than impressed, as she parried the next blow and then came to a stop. 'What?' she demanded, 'he dies of old age?' It was Doyle's turn to snicker. 'Or _you_ swoop in and save me?' she finished, her tone was accusatory.

Angel looked discomfited.

'Ah - c'mon man, she wants to learn how to fight, not swirl a sword around her head… however erotic that might be….' the Irishman trailed off, and then shook himself - forcing his mind back on topic. 'And she's great as this stuff - she's got the potential to be a really good fighter - but you gotta show her the right moves. This isn't about you bein' the big, strapping hero for once, bud. You gotta give her the tools to be a hero herself.'

'What he said,' Cordelia said to Angel, nodding along. 'Angel, I didn't ask you to train me so I could stave. I already know how to stave. _Now_ I need to learn how to fight.'

The vampire looked down at his feet, 'you don't think I would?' he asked. His tone was injured.

'Would what?' Cordelia just sounded irritated.

'Save you?' He still wasn't making eye contact.

Doyle leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. This was what he had been talking to Cordelia about, the other day. Angel's reactions were all off, when it came to Cordy… and the half demon could only come up with one explanation for it. He wasn't worried, as such, he trusted Cordelia absolutely - he knew she loved him and him alone. And he trusted Angel - so far - for all his weirdness, he hadn't actually made a move.

But he was still... _concerned_ by this turn of events. It would make everything more difficult. More strained. It changed the way things had always been between the three of them, and - creature of habit that he was - he didn't think this particular change was for the better.

Like before, however, Cordelia didn't notice anything amiss. She just thought the vampire was being his usual dopey self. 'Men-folk not always there to protect the women-folk, you know?' she said, her tone turning her words into a mocking explanation - as if she thought Angel was a little hard of understanding. 'Besides, what if it turned out _you_ were the guy I had to fight? Could happen.'

'She's got y' there, bud.' Doyle leaned back, again - and winked at Cordelia. 'No point in making her promise to kill y' dead if y' won't show her how.'

'OK,' though Angel didn't look happy with what he was agreeing to do.

He raised his sword and took a stance, Cordelia copied him. 'When you put an adversary down, you wanna make sure he doesn't get up again. So like I showed you...' They moved through the steps in exact parallel, swinging the swords, slowly, around their heads and then lunging them outward. 'Force the guy to counter and he'll open up,' Angel told her, 'now we'll go at half speed until...' he went to put his sword away as he was talking.

Cordelia interrupted him, 'no need,' she said. 'I got it. Three years of varsity cheer squad, I only ever have to be shown a move once.'

Angel looked dubious, and began to chuckle, 'you know, Cordelia, handling a lethal weapon is bit different to waving a pom pom.'

Cordelia glanced back at Doyle - a 'can you believe this guy?' expression on her face, he looked at her encouragingly, and she grinned. 'Ready! O-kay,' she called out like she was about to begin a cheer. Then, moving much faster than before, she repeated the steps Angel had shown her, until she had the vampire pinned in the corner - the sword at his throat.

He glanced down at the blade. 'Go team!' he said weakly.

Cordy withdrew her blade, and she and her boyfriend laughed. 'That was great!' Doyle enthused. 'I wanna watch you beat Angel up some more - go again!'

Angel threw him a dark look. 'I think that's enough training for today, don't you, Cordy?' the vampire asked.

'Fraidy cat!' Doyle muttered.

But Cordelia agreed with Angel. 'I'm beat,' she said, 'and sweaty. I need to take a shower,' she glanced back at Doyle, 'you coming with?'

He slid off the table, immediately, 'well that's an even better offer than watching you humiliate the dark avenger, I'm in.' He wrapped his arm around her and they headed for the stairs. Angel watched them go - his face kept carefully blank.

'You know - you are really good at this,' Doyle was saying, 'like - preternaturally good.'

'I told you,' Cordelia replied, 'I'm a cheerleader. My reflexes and coordination are incredibly well honed.'

'Yeah but... Even for a cheerleader - from the hellmouth - y' real good at it.'

'There's something else I'm real good at,' her voice was teasing, suggestive… the basement door closed behind them, and Angel continued to put the weapons away, trying to keep his mind as blank as his face.

* * *

Lilah strode through the halls of Wolfram and Hart as fast as her long legs could carry her. Her secretary scurried along at her heels, answering her rapidly fired questions - security had brought him in twenty minutes ago, and his family were already on their way. But still, Lilah wasn't happy. She should have been pulled out of her meeting immediately - this took precedence over all other cases.

She entered her office - and her mood became even blacker. Gavin was in there - chatting away to the man security had brought in. He had no right to talk to this man - to be anywhere near this case - Lilah had worked damn hard to get Billy released from hell. She had had to purposefully piss off the caped crusader, himself, and then force him to work for her… though the opportunity to disfigure and maim that hated, runty, little half breed sidekick of his had been a plus.

'Lilah,' Gavin smiled his insincere smile, 'I was just keeping Billy, here, company.'

Lilah smiled back, equally insincerely, 'thanks, awfully Gavin. I'll take it from here. Billy, where have you been? Your family have been worried.'

'Went for a walk,' the man shrugged in reply.

'A walk?' she sounded disbelieving, 'for three days?'

'The boy was feeling cooped up,' Gavin said to her, still smiling that sickly, dangerous smile, like he had scored a triumph - got one over her - by getting to Billy before her. She had to get rid of him.

'Gavin - why don't you go - close an escrow, or something?' She tried to make sure that her disdain for his particular specialism within the law dripped from her every word. Then she spoke to Billy again - reminding him he wasn't supposed to go out alone, reminding him of what happened last time. 'You don't want to end up in that awful place again do you?' She was keeping her voice soft and entreating - sympathetic, though this man made her skin crawl. He made her want to back away, as far as possible, and then run from the room… but, if he had a similar effect on Gavin, then the real estate lawyer wasn't showing his discomfort - and neither would she.

The office door opened again, and Billy's uncle - Congressman Blim - stood there, ready to take his errant nephew home. 'I trust you managed to stay out of trouble, this time, Billy?' the Congressman said.

'No trouble.'

Congressmen Blim looked at Lilah, 'well, this is the second time you have returned our nephew safely to us,' he looked at Gavin, 'thank you.'

'Our pleasure,' Gavin said. Billy and his uncle started to leave.

'Our pleasure in the sense that...' Lilah called to their departing backs, but the door closed behind them. She turned to Gavin, ' _he_ had nothing to do with it.' She glared at him. He smiled at her. She told him to get out.

'I wasn't finished,' he replied.

'No.' she squared up to him - she was taller than he was, in her heels. 'You really were. To make myself clear - you go sniffing around one of my clients again, I think we're gonna have a problem.'

The smile finally dropped from Gavin's face. In fact his expression seemed to screw up with rage. 'Think?' he asked. 'Who told you you could _think_? You know, why don't you try _listening_ for a while - instead of flapping that fat mouth of yours?'

Lilah laughed in his face. 'You weren't exactly captain of the debate team, were you, Gavin?' she said, turning her back on him.

She didn't see the way his body tensed, or his eyes clouded over - all his usual smarm and polish, his cultivated civilised demeanour, evaporating in the face of her laughter. 'You know? It's times like this I still miss Lindsey,' she continued, 'at least he knew how to …'

Gavin lunged forward and grabbed her by her hair. He smashed her into the glass shelves on the wall, and, once she had fallen to the ground amidst the tumbling, sharp fragments, he dove on top of her. He wrapped his hands around her neck - and squeezed...

...

Walking down the corridors, Billy heard the sound of the smashing glass, and smiled to himself.

* * *

The team were all round at Wesley's place. Gunn and Angel were sat on the couch - playing a video game - and Doyle and Fred were perched on either arm, watching. Wesley and Cordelia were in the kitchen. The British man poured the woman a cup of tea, and she took it with a smile.

'Ah c'mon man, y' gotta kick him - kick him!' Doyle's frustrated voice came floating through into the kitchen, he was trying to coach Angel to victory - but was not having much luck.

Cordelia shook her head, ruefully. 'You know? Wes, I'm not sure this was really the way you envisioned tonight panning out,' she told her boss.

'I don't know what you mean,' he said, quickly, pouring himself his own cup of tea.

...

'Dead! So dead!' Gunn's triumph was audible even in the next room. 'So very very dead, Just how dead are you, huh?'

'I'm tired of being the dead one,' Angel sulked.

'Y' didn' kick him,' Doyle was exasperated, 'I told y' to kick him. You needed to press x and y together and finish him off!'

'You know? How about you leave fighting strategy to me and I leave vision having to you, huh?' Angel snapped at his friend. Gunn was laughing. Fred had begun to smile, as well.

...

Wesley turned to look through the doorway, at his noisy coworkers; and when he turned back, it was to find Cordelia fixing him with a knowing, but pitying, look. 'If you want to get to know Fred better, maybe next time don't invite the entire gang over to your intimate dinner for two,' she said. 'I feel a bit silly…' she counted on her fingers, ' _sixth_ wheeling.'

He began to sputter, and protest - but then quailed under her continued knowing gaze. 'Was I that obvious?' he asked.

She leaned forward, and lowered her voice to a whisper. 'I don't think anybody else noticed.'

'Not even Doyle?' the watcher asked. The Irishman was usually pretty observant.

But Cordelia looked through into the next room, where her boyfriend was just as glued to the t.v screen as everyone else, and shook her head. 'He's having Angel issues at the moment,' she confided, 'he keeps banging on about … something…' she frowned, 'I'm not sure what, exactly… but it isn't leaving him much time to pay attention to anyone else.'

'Not even you?' he took a sip of his tea and arched an eyebrow at her.

But she laughed, 'oh - he always makes time for me - I make sure of that.' Then she pulled her attention away from the others and looked back at Wesley, her expression stern. 'And if you want what Doyle and I have - with Fred - then you have to speak up. No more hiding behind the rest of us - no more group gatherings. Just go right up to her and tell her how you feel.'

The watcher began to protest again, horrified at the prospect of having to declare his intentions to the object of his affection, but he was interrupted by Doyle yelling out and falling off the arm of the couch...

...

The half demon lay on the floor, the heels of his hands digging into his eyes, as his body twitched and fitted under the onslaught of the vision pain. Cordelia immediately abandoned her tea, scraped her chair back, and ran into the next room. Wesley followed on, more slowly.

As he came into the living room, Doyle came round from his vision, and pulled himself upright. Angel immediately vacated his place on the sofa, and ushered his friend into the space. Cordelia perched on the arm, beside him. 'What did you see?' she asked, her voice gentle - he looked freaked out, and she guessed that this had been a bad one.

He leaned forward, and held his head in his hands. 'It was a convenience store, on the Westside, a man was attacking a woman.' He took a deep breath - and let it out as a sigh of profound sadness. He shook his head. 'She was his wife… why would…?'

He looked up at Cordelia, and, as she looked back, she could see the pain in his eyes, the toll that bearing the visions took on him - the way the evil he saw ate away at his soul. She reached her arm out, and stroked his hair, soothingly, her own eyes clouding with tears. 'We'll help her,' she promised.

'Right - Yeah,' Angel became all business, after the shocked silence that had followed Doyle's pronouncement. 'How many convenience stores on the Westside?'

Fred took it as a mathematical problem. 'Well, even if you just include Santa Monica, Beverly Hills and Malibu, the combined population is something like a hundred thirty thousand people spread over more than thirty square miles. And given that…'

'A lot,' Gunn interrupted.

Fred glanced down at him. 'I was - getting there.'

Wesley nodded and began to outline the plan - they would split into two teams. He and Gunn would …

'No.' Doyle suddenly interrupted. His face had taken on a blank, closed expression - as if he were trying to conceal his true feelings, not let the emotion show. 'This murder - it happened a week ago. This poor lady has been dead for a whole week. We're too late to save her.' He glanced up at Fred, still perched on the arm - and thought of all the other times he had failed as a seer. ' _I'm_ too late to save her. _Again_.'

* * *

They had returned to the Hyperion. Wesley had left them, for a while, and when he returned he was carrying a file under his arm. He dropped it on the counter, and everyone gathered round to look at it. 'It's everything about the crime I believe you saw in your vision,' the watcher told Doyle. He had police reports, the husband's confession, stills from the CCTV footage - and, he cautioned - the crime scene photos. He had bought them from a source - the kind of person who would sell such information to the tabloids if the victim or perpetrator were well known.

Everyone began to sift through the evidence. Cordelia picked up a crime scene photo of the murdered woman. Doyle took it off her. 'Don't look at that,' he said to her. 'It's bad enough I have to see … you shouldn't have to look at pictures o' my visions. It's not your atonement.'

'Charlene Baird,' Gunn read from the crime report.

Wesley nodded. 'The victim. She and the perpetrator were married for thirty years. No history of domestic violence.'

'Why'd he do it?' Fred asked.

'He said she wouldn't listen to him,' Wesley replied. 'He was trying to get her to stop talking.' Everybody visibly recoiled at his words, their disgust at the man - and their sorrow for his victim - clearly playing across their faces.

'But I don't get it,' Gunn said, 'the guy confessed. Case closed. Why are The Powers running visions through poor Irish's head?'

'I don't know,' said Wesley.

'I do.' Angel had been looking at one of the stills from the CCTV footage. He put it down on the counters for the others to look at.

'Oh man,' Gunn said. Wesley stared. His face tensed up, but he said nothing.

'Oh,' Fred gasped, looking between the picture and Doyle. She bit her lip. 'I'm sorry,' she whispered.

Cordelia and Doyle both glanced at each other - and then looked back at the picture. 'I don't get it,' Cordelia said, 'what's wrong?'

Doyle looked at the blurry black and white image of the young man standing in the convenience store - the timestamp told him this was captured just minutes before the attack. He was pretty sure he'd never seen him before. 'Him?' he asked the others. 'Who is he?'

No one answered.

* * *

Wesley, Fred and Gunn sat on the round sofa in the middle of the lobby - listening to Doyle's fury, from a distance. Angel had taken him into Wes' office - and Cordelia had followed them in. The door was closed, but the three associates could still hear every word that the half demon yelled. They looked at each other, uncomfortably, unsure what to do.

...

'What d'y' mean.. This is the guy?' Doyle yelled into Angel's face. He was pacing up and down, in the enclosed space, but he stopped whenever he wanted to shout something.

'This is the man that I let out of hell a couple of months back, when you were attacked by your visions.' The vampire kept his voice gentle and quiet.

Doyle snorted an angry breath of disbelief. 'Y' let him out of hell… and then just let him _wander_ free?'

'Doyle,' Cordelia tried to cut in, to mollify him.

But he didn't want to listen, he turned on her instead. 'Don't y' get it?' he yelled. 'This is on me. That dead woman is on me. She's my fault! She's dead because I couldn't handle the visions.' He turned back to the desk and swept everything off to the floor, in his rage.

...

Out in the lobby, the others flinched, as they heard the sound of the books and files hitting the floor.

...

'Doyle - that isn't true,' Cordelia said to him. 'This isn't your fault.'

But he just laughed, bitterly, 'yeah - well, you tell The Powers that, Princess. 'Cause they seem pretty clear about where they lay the blame. Why else d'y think they chose to rerun Charlene Baird's brutal murder in my head a whole week later? If it was just to warn me - they could've sent a vision of his next victim, before it happened.' He shook his head - still furious, 'this is another punishment. And I deserve it. I let this happen.'

'No, Doyle! We all made the decision for Angel to rescue that guy. We all made the decision that you were too important to leave to suffer. As I recall, you were largely unconscious when these decisions were being made. If it's on any of us - it's on _all_ of us.'

'Then why am _I_ the only one that's being punished by The Powers?' He shook his head again, hanging it low. He began to mutter. 'I should never've…'

'No.' Angel cut through his words. 'You did nothing wrong. I saved him to save you - and I'd do it again. I'm the one that let him out - and I'm the one that will stop him. But this isn't your fault and it isn't my fault and it isn't the rest of the team's fault. We're not responsible. But I know who is…'

* * *

BAM. The door to Lilah's apartment was kicked in. She was pouring herself a brandy, and she jumped at the noise. She smirked when she saw who it was. 'You know that's a very dramatic entrance - except for the part where you can't enter.'

'You seem a little jumpy there, Lilah,' Angel said to her.

'It's been a long day at the office.'

'Then you know that your boy is on the loose. You know what he's doing.'

'It's been brought to my attention.' Her voice sounded bitter - and, as she walked towards the door, Angel finally caught sight of her face.

Her eye was blackened, a dark purple bruise spreading around her socket - and the lid was swollen shut. The same bruising covered her jaw, there was a cut across her nose - and clearly discernible hand prints around her neck. The vampire's mouth fell open. 'God, are you…?'

'I'm fine - you should see the other guy.'

'I plan to,' he assured her.

'Billy never touched me,' she told him. But he knew that - he had some kind of power that made… 'Billy never touched me,' she interrupted, 'and you can't touch him. Nobody can. Billy as in Blim. as in Congressman Blim's nephew. That family is the closest thing this country has to royalty. They'd own half the eastern seaboard even if they weren't clients of ours. The law won't go near him.'

'I'm not the law,' Angel said.

But that made Lilah laugh. Billy wasn't some three horned Gurnarbeast that Angel could chop into meatloaf. This was more complicated. More delicate.

'Why are you still protecting him after what he did?'

That made her laugh again. 'I'm sorry, but this deep chivalric concern coming from the only man who _definitely_ wants to kill me is just a little too much to take on a day like this.'

'Your hands are shaking.'

'Stay the hell away from my client.' She slammed the door in his face, and Angel rang Wesley.

* * *

Doyle came out of the bathroom, the lobby was empty except for Cordelia. 'Where'd everybody go?' he asked.

'Um - I think Fred went back up to her room.'

'And Wes and Gunn?'

Cordelia twisted her mouth up in anguish, and glanced around the room looking for a comforting lie. 'Cordelia?' His voice had a warning edge to it.

'They - they went out when Angel called. He has a lead on this guy,' she admitted.

'And they didn't think to tell me?'

She looked anguished again. 'Wes said… and Angel agreed… that you shouldn't be in on this. It's too raw for you. You're…'

'They're benching me?' He sounded furiously disbelieving.

'No. No. not at all… but…'

'Dammit Cordelia!' he turned and knocked everything off the counter - the same as he had back in Wes's office. The crime scene photos fluttered to the floor. 'This. Is. All. My. _Fault_. Do you get that? Do you understand that? This is all happenin' because of me. And the guys decide - behind my back - to not even give me a chance to put it right.' He slammed his fist down on the counter.

Cordelia flinched. 'You're scaring me,' she said - her voice small.

She had only ever seen him like this once before - back in Pylea, when he had first found out he couldn't have children - and he decided he would give his visions away to spite the universe. Doyle just didn't get angry - not seriously so - and both times his uncharacteristic explosion of rage had been linked to his visions - to his life as a demon and his path as a seer.

She didn't want it to, but it frightened her that, deep down, he was still so angry about his demon half - still so unwilling to accept the course of his life - and his gift from The Powers - even though it was that that had brought them together in the first place. It made her worry that she was fooling herself into believing they were happy - for how could they be truly happy if he was still crippled with self loathing and anger?

He took some deep breaths, as if to calm himself down, and then looked at her. 'Help me?' he asked.

'What?'

'I need to stop this guy, Cordelia. I _have_ to do this. And if the guys won't let me be a part of their little investigation - then I gotta run my own case. Will you help me?'

'Doyle ...I…'

'Please?' The anger seemed to have drained out of his voice. His eyes had that same pained expression they had worn just after he had received the vision - and, once more, Cordelia was acutely aware of the heavy burden he carried - having his mind exposed to so much suffering.

'OK,' she nodded, 'I'll help you.'

* * *

The guys pulled up outside of the Blim estate - imposing cast iron gates barred their entrance. 'Not very welcoming is it?' Gunn said.

Wesley shook his head, 'and I don't suppose ringing the doorbell will work either.'

'We could sneak in dressed as security guards,' the street fighter suggested.

'Yes - or how about…'

Ignoring them both, Angel glanced up at the gates… and then leapt straight over them - fifteen feet into the air - in a single bound. He disappeared into the bushes. Gunn and Wesley watched him go. 'You wanna go next?' Gunn asked.

...

As Angel moved through the grounds, Billy came into view - talking on the phone just the other side of some French windows. Hidden as the vampire was, it seemed like Billy could sense him - as he lowered the phone and stared out, looking directly at where Angel was concealed.

Using all his speed, Angel abandoned the bushes, jumped over the low wall and then threw a metal garden chair right through the patio doors. The glass smashed and he stepped inside. 'Why doesn't it surprise me that I can walk straight in here?' he said.

'As far as I'm concerned you have a standing invitation.' Billy's voice was calm, polite, unruffled. He was not fazed by the destruction of the patio doors or the entrance of a vampire. If anything he seemed a little amused.

'You're not quite human, are you?'

Billy shrugged. 'Not quite. More than you.'

'And you like to hurt women do you Billy? That make you feel like a man?'

'I've never hurt a woman in my life.' He smiled, 'I just like to watch.'

'Not anymore,' the vampire promised, 'I'm sending you back.' But Billy only smiled again - he didn't think so.

'Hands where I can see them, turn around,' a male voice interrupted. Angel put his hands in the air.

'LAPD,' a female voice said. He turned - the cops had arrived - already. But there was a surprise in store for him. 'I think you're looking for me,' Billy said to the police.

'William Blim?'

He nodded - and then asked if they had found the body, had she been where he said she was? The cops confirmed that she had, and told Billy they were taking him in for questioning. Angel looked between them, not really understanding what was going on. The male cop walked towards the young man, ready to cuff him. 'Make sure you read him his rights, Sanchez,' his partner said.

As Sanchez reached out to snap on the cuffs, Billy laid a hand on the cop's wrist. 'Will those be necessary?' he said, 'I won't give you any trouble.' The male cop glanced towards the female cop, and she nodded. He put his cuffs away and led Billy to the door.

He didn't notice, but the place where Billy's fingertips had touched his skin glowed bright red, for a moment, before returning back to normal.

As they left, the female cop looked at Angel, 'who are you?'

'He's no one,' Billy told her. And the small group - the cops and their prisoner - exited the house. Angel stared after them, as they went. He wasn't sure exactly what had happened but, somehow, Billy had managed to slip from his grasp.

* * *

The police car drove down the road. The woman cop was driving - and Sanchez was criticising. 'Hey why are we going down this way? I thought I told you to take Pico.'

'Relax, Sanchez, we'll get there.'

In the back seat, Billy began to smile to himself.

'Did you just tell me to relax?' Sanchez demanded, 'you think you can talk to me like that?'

'I'd talk to you with my finger, but I like both hands on the wheel when I'm driving,' his partner retorted.

'Pull over.'

'What?'

'Pull over.'

'What is your problem?'

'I'll tell you my problem. I got a woman here who won't listen.'

Billy's smile grew even wider, as Sanchez dove for the wheel, the cops struggled - and the car skidded out of control...

* * *


	22. Billy: Part Two

Cordelia and Doyle had been putting together a small arsenal, when the front doors to the hotel opened, and the three men strode in. The couple hastily dropped their weapons out of sight, and looked at their associates, expectantly.

'The police arrested him,' Angel told them, 'took him away right under my nose - there was nothing I could do.' Wesley went into the office to make a phone call, Fred came back downstairs to see what was going on. The vampire leaned on the counter, and told them what else he knew. 'He tipped them off about another body - they were taking him for questioning.'

Doyle closed his eyes. 'He killed someone else?'

'This isn't your fault, Doyle,' the vampire said, quietly.

'There must be somethin' else we can do,' the half demon replied - he looked around at the others.

'There is,' Angel agreed. He looked at Fred. 'Fred, go into Wes's office - in the middle drawer there's a police scanner…' He had stolen that scanner from a police car a couple of years ago, back when Kate was trying to hunt down his own serial killing protege, Penn. 'See if you can tune into their frequency, listen out for him arriving at the precinct.' The woman nodded, and went into the office to look where he had told her.

'Then what?' Doyle asked.

'Then I go down there and break him out.'

Wesley put the phone down and returned to the others. He had spoken to his contact at the city morgue - a woman's body had been discovered earlier that night, after the police had received a tip off.

'Billy,' said Angel.

Wesley nodded, but Gunn looked confused. 'I don't get it,' he said, 'even if he did it, he still didn't _do_ it. So why confess?'

'It gets him out,' Angel said, thoughtfully. But Gunn was sceptical. Sure it got him out - of a palatial mansion and into a holding cell. The others disagreed, though. The cell wouldn't hold him for long - a burning cube of fire in hell hadn't been able to hold him, regular bars would not prove much of a challenge. All he would need to get out this time would be his lawyer. 'I'm gonna get there before Lilah does,' Angel said, turning to leave.

'What if he lays his whammy on you?' Cordelia asked, she sounded worried.

'I don't intend for him to be conscience long enough to try it,' he said.

But he was interrupted by Fred scurrying out of the office, clutching the scanner. 'He's not there!' she cried, 'I just heard it. The patrol car carrying Billy never made it to the station. There's been an accident.'

* * *

The three men had gone to the scene of the accident. They had been surprised that Doyle did not try and insist he accompany them, but he had seemed happy to be left behind - and they didn't have time to query it.

There was an ambulance parked up, its lights still flashing - and another police car. The car from the accident was stopped dead in the middle of the road - facing the wrong way. The back door hung open, and it was all bent out of shape - as if someone had kicked their way through it with immense force. Wesley walked away from the scene and returned to Gunn - telling him what he knew. One of the police officers had attacked their partner. She had been forced to shoot him, and had been taken to the hospital. Following a quick discussion, Gunn left to follow her to the hospital in the hope of striking up a conversation with medical staff and finding out what they knew.

Wesley went over to Angel. The vampire was standing across the road from the crashed patrol car. 'The blood in that car,' he said to the watcher, 'some of it's his. Not human.' He walked a little way down the road - there was a bloody hand print on the wall. 'He came through here.'

Wesley touched the hand print. 'And recently - it's still wet.' He took out a piece of paper and pressed it against the print. Billy's bloody hand was now imprinted on the paper. 'I'll take this sample back to the hotel, see if I can determine just what sort of creature Billy is.' But Angel didn't have time for that, and he disappeared down the street tracking Billy, and leaving Wesley to return to the hotel alone.

* * *

Cordelia took the tazer out of the weapons cabinet and stuck it in her bag. 'I'm taking this,' she told Doyle, 'it worked well for me against that old guy wearing Angel's skin.'

'You think it'll be able to take Billy out?'

'I think, if I zap it enough times, it'll take an elephant out.'

Fred came walking down the stairs. 'What are you two doing?' she asked.

'Uh - errand,' Cordelia told her 'we're just popping out to run a normal, everyday errand.'

'I don't think you should do this,' Fred said, looking at them both.

Doyle turned away from her and continued to pack weapons into a bag, ignoring her warning. Cordelia sighed, and pulled Fred further away. 'He has to,' she whispered.

'This is really dangerous,' Fred whispered back, 'Angel -'

'Might get there first,' Cordelia agreed, 'and if he does - and we don't have to take out psycho, demon boy ourselves - I, for one, will not be complaining. But _he_ needs to try. He thinks this is his fault.'

Fred glanced over at where Doyle was still packing up weapons, studiously ignoring them - pretending he couldn't hear their hushed conversation. She looked back at Cordelia and nodded. Cordelia smiled, thankfully, 'just don't let on where we've gone, OK?' She walked back over to Doyle. 'I think that's enough,' she said, glancing at all the blades he had amassed. 'I think we're ready for him.'

Her boyfriend nodded, 'let's go.' And they left through the side door.

...

A moment later, Wesley walked through the main doors, and smiled when he saw Fred standing there, alone. 'Fred, you're here, good. I was hoping you'd assist me. ' He held up the bloody hand print. 'I managed to lift a sample of Billy's blood. Maybe we can identify his demon lineage and somehow figure out how his power works.'

...

They had moved into the office, and Wesley was getting his microscope out. 'Would you hand me the…' he looked up and Fred was holding the box of glass slides out ready. He gave her a smile. 'Thank you.'

* * *

Lilah sighed, as she went to open the door. It was late for someone to be knocking - and she wasn't in the mood. But her mood, foul as it was, took a downturn when she saw who stood on the threshold. 'Oh look, it's Cordelia and her half breed,' she sneered. She glanced at all the weapons they carried between them, 'come to kill me, at last?'

'Looks like someone's already had a pretty good go at that,' Doyle said to her, 'Jesus Christ, Lilah! What happened to your face?'

'I think Ms. Morgan here, has already had a little run in with your friend, Doyle, after all - she's his lawyer.'

'Billy did this to you?'

Lilah laughed, wryly, 'oh please - spare me the faux concern!' She stepped back to let the couple enter, closed the door behind them, and went to pour herself another brandy. 'Don't pretend you're not happy this has happened to me. Don't pretend you're not here to gloat.'

'I'm not.' Doyle looked discomfited. Lilah had attempted to ruin his life this time last year, and it was her fault Billy was free - her that had arranged to have him, Doyle, attacked by his own visions until the team had no choice but to rescue the incarcerated demon. But he still didn't wish this on her.

But his reply left Lilah less than impressed. 'God, Doyle, what's wrong with you? I've done more than enough to you, during the time we've been acquainted, to warrant you having a real, personal grievance against me. I finally get mine, and you _didn't want this?_ What? Is this some innate chivalry you got going on? Or do you just need to grow a pair?'

'Maybe he just isn't an evil, skanky ho bag, like you,' Cordelia said, arching her eyebrow at the lawyer.

'So, you know me,' Lilah shrugged. 'Then what brings you here, if it's not vengeance - and it's not to gloat?'

'I'm gonna kill Billy,' Doyle said to her, 'for what was done to me - for what he's doin' to all these other people. I'm gonna put a stop to him, once and for all - send him back to the hell that Angel rescued him from. And you're gonna help me. You're gonna tell me and Cordelia everything about Billy that you didn't tell Angel. And then I'm gonna hunt him down. They're gonna need dental records to identify him once I'm done with him.'

'Wow,' Lilah chuckled again, 'that's the first time I've ever heard you sound like a real man, and not some simp.' Another laugh, 'which, in the circumstances, is unfortunate - for you, that is. But why do you think I'm going to help you?'

'Look in the mirror, sweetheart,' Doyle growled, 'look at what he already did to y'.'

The lawyer took a sip of her drink. 'I know the risks of my job and I accept them.'

'Then why were you crying five minutes ago?' Cordelia asked her. Lilah looked at her, and she smiled - a patronising smile. 'There's not a t _hing_ about badly reapplied mascara that I don't know,' she offered by way of explanation.

The two women stared at each other for a moment and then, 'you can't beat him,' Lilah said. She turned to Doyle, 'especially not you.'

'What's wrong with me?'

'Well - I could make a list, but in this case it's nothing personal, sweetie. It's your Y chromosome.'

'How's that?'

'Billy doesn't make everybody crazy,' Lilah explained to the couple, 'just the menfolk. He touches them and it brings … something - out in them. Misogyny.'

'I don't hate…'

'It's primordial, Doyle,' Lilah interrupted him. 'That aggression, that need to dominate - all that testosterone just swirling around in you all. He strips away all the logic, the reason that men normally have, that they use to control their darker urges… and he just leaves the animal in its place. And then, the victims of his touch just take all their rage, their feelings of inadequacy, their desire for power - and turn it on the nearest woman to them. If you go after Billy - and he touches you, sure you might kill him… but you'll kill little Cordelia here, as well. You think you can live with yourself if you do that? I don't think you can - I don't even think you'll risk it.' She smirked, 'I told you - you can't beat him.'

'But I can,' Cordelia said. 'He can't lay his whammy on me. Tell me where to find him.'

'No.'

'Tell me where to find him,' she repeated herself.

'What will you do, Cordelia, beat me up?'

'It crossed my mind.'

'I'm not helping you.'

'Y'know, Lilah…' Doyle hadn't spoken since Lilah had explained Billy's power - and he'd realised just how ill equipped he was to face off against this man - and that he had just run, headlong, into another failure. He'd hung his head, staring at his feet, and cursing that Billy's power had to be _this_. But, as Lilah refused to answer Cordelia, he looked up and spoke again. 'You've tried to make me a victim - a lot - over the past couple o' years. You've really gone out of your way to make my life a living hell.'

'So what? I owe you?'

'No. Nothing so prosaic. You know what the worst thing about having someone come after you again and again, in an attempt to destroy you, is? The feeling of powerlessness. Not knowing what's gonna come next and how you'll fight it and if you'll be OK. The utter hopelessness of knowing that there is somebody out there who can take your life away - and that they're willin' to do it - and there's nothin' you can do to stop them. Now, it seems to me you got a taste o' that today, darlin'. Someone beat you down, and you wouldn't have known if you were gonna live through it. And now; your eye is swollen shut, and your face is a mess, you're drinking alone, cryin' alone - and all your confidence is gone. He took it. And as long as Billy is out there - you don't know when he's gonna come back and take it again. And if you'll survive the next time. No one should have to feel that way. Not me, not you, no one. Ever. So you tell us where Billy is - and we'll stop him.'

* * *

Two guys stood by a taxi cab, talking. Angel sidled over to them to hear what they were saying. 'He seemed like such a levelled guy, you know?' the first man was saying. 'Always polite with the 'yes, sirs' and the 'thank you, sirs,' And to lose it like that? I didn't see it coming - did you?'

'I got to say,' the second man replied, 'I understand why he did it. I mean, there is a point, am I right? How many times do you feel like taking a fist to a customer?'

'One of your drivers finally snapped, huh?' Angel asked them, the cab drivers agreed that that was the long and short of it - he'd beaten the hell out of one of his fares. 'A woman?' the vampire wanted to know.

'That surprise you?' the second man asked, 'probably sitting in the back, nagging, telling him how to drive. You know the type.'

'Yeah, probably had it coming, right?' The cab driver failed to notice the dangerous undertone in Angel's words.

He shrugged, 'I'm just sayin'...' and suddenly found himself gripped threateningly by the lapels.

'Get out of here,' Angel snarled at the other driver, who quickly ran off without a backward glance. Then he stared into the face of the man he was menacing. 'This driver who snapped? You're gonna tell me what his last stop was, right before he beat up that woman - I'm just saying.'

* * *

Gunn sat in the hospital waiting room. The cop had been brought in and was being checked over by the doctors. The other cop - the man she had been forced to shoot, had also been brought in. The whole place was awash with police; visiting the woman, muttering in corners, lingering to see if they could see what was happening with Sanchez. The street fighter scanned the room hoping to see... There she was. He got out of his seat, and approached her. 'Detective Lockley?'

'Gunn?' she gave him a harried smile, 'what brings you here?'

'Same thing as you, I reckon.' He allowed his eyes to slide over to the door that obscured the woman cop.

Kate sighed and, grabbing him by the arm, pulled him away from the other police officers and towards a quiet corner. 'Are you telling me there's something … other wordly - in all this?' she whispered. 'So far none of this had made any sense - you mean you guys have an explanation?… One I won't be able to use, I'm guessing.'

'Pretty much,' Gunn told her. 'What do you know about the guy they were transporting?' But she shook her head, she hadn't heard anything about him … other than that he was missing. 'OK,' the street fighter shrugged, 'what does the name Billy Blim mean to you?'

'Blim? As in congressman Blim?'

'Uhuh - Billy is the guy's nephew. And a serious piece of work. Had his own private suite in hell and everything. But he escaped, and now he's back in the world - and everyone who comes in contact with him - somehow - ends up beatin' the crap out of the nearest person. Angel's trying to track him down… but we need to know everything we can - about his victims - we're trying to piece together how he's doin' it. What about the cop and her partner - they'd work together long?'

'They'd been partners for years,' Kate told him, 'they were good friends… that's why no one can quite believe what's happened, they were good cops - followed the rules, worked hard - they were popular, this is…' she pushed her blonde hair back, and blew her cheeks out, 'wow - I just can't believe this is happening. How did this guy escape from hell?'

Gunn looked uncomfortable for a moment. 'Angel rescued him,' he admitted, 'wasn't his fault, though. Your boyfriend's old firm sort of held Irish hostage until Angel agreed to help. We didn't have a choice.'

'Wolfram and Hart are all over this?' she asked, and looked even more frustrated. 'So I'm guessing Billy is untouchable?' Then her expression cleared. 'Hey, how is Doyle anyway, after… everything - earlier in the year?'

'He's OK,' Gunn said, 'You know Doyle - as long as he's got Cordy he's all kinds of good… but this past year has been hard, and some things don't just go away on their own, y'know what I'm sayin'? We've put the team back together after Angel got over himself… but I don't know that Irish has really forgotten that he was in trouble and the dark avenger didn't even care enough to even ask how he was doin'.'

Kate nodded her head, remembering how obsessed Angel had been with the evil law firm - to the exclusion of everything else.

'Is there anythin' else you can tell me about this case?' Gunn asked her.

'You seem to know more than I do,' she told him.

'Yeah - but what did the cop say happened? Have you spoken to her?'

Kate had taken her statement, it seemed. She and Sanchez had been called out to the Blim estate, where they had taken Billy in for questioning. They hadn't cuffed him as he promised to come quietly. Sanchez had escorted him out - and then once they were back in the car, he started berating his partner… and then he'd attacked her.

'So Sanchez had direct contact with Billy? One on one?'' Gunn asked.

Kate nodded, again. 'Does that help?'

Gunn shrugged, 'I'll tell Wes - he's the brain, thanks for your help, Detective Lockley.'

* * *

Dylan Blim's penthouse suite was packed with his friends - influential, rich, bright young things - just like himself. The music blared out, the alcohol flowed, and he was pretending that he wasn't aware of what was being snorted in the luxury bathroom. As he leaned over the pool table, and potted a red, he glanced across at the couple on the couch - energetically, and enthusiastically making out.

One of his friend's came over to him to tell him that one of his cousins had turned up and wanted to speak to him. 'Which one?' he laughed, 'there are hundreds of them.'

'Uh - I think he said his name was Billy.'

The laughter died on Dylan's lips, and he stood up straight. 'That's not possible - Billy's…' he trailed off as he saw the man himself appear right by his side.

'Hi Dylan.'

'Billy,' he nodded at him, trying to keep his voice even.

'I didn't know you were having a party.'

'Billy-' he swallowed, and began again. 'I-I thought we agreed you weren't going to come around here anymore after that last thing?'

But Billy wasn't paying attention to him. He was staring across at the couple kissing on the couch. 'I think we should talk to them about appropriate public behaviour - you wanna do it, or should I?'

Dylan swallowed hard, again.

* * *

'OK - so we just need to get to this Dylan guy's place... I hope he'll let us in, if he's American royalty,' Doyle said, as he and Cordelia left Lilah's building. 'I can't imagine the Queen o' England just lettin' us in, if we rocked up to Buckingham Palace and rang the doorbell...'

Cordelia stopped walking, 'Doyle…'

'Well, maybe you, But definitely not... what?' He also came to a stop and turned to look at his girlfriend, a questioning expression on his face.

She sighed, deeply. 'Doyle - you're not coming with me.' Her voice was quiet, but determined. She watched as his brow furrowed deeper, and then the confused look slowly changed to one of outrage. He opened his mouth to protest, but she raised a hand to cut him off. 'Listen to me,' she said, 'you're already in a crappy mood. You are not going to pose any challenge to this Billy guy the way you're currently feeling. You're already only an inch from snapping. But if Billy lays his whammy on you, then it's _me_ you'll snap at… And by snap I mean beat, or possibly kill.'

'Cordelia - I would never…'

'I know _you_ would never. But it's not normal Doyle I'm worrying about, it's the infected with murderous misogyny Doyle I'm thinking of. And whatever _he_ does - _you_ have to live with - forever. You can't go near Billy.'

'But y' can't possibly think for a minute I'm gonna let you go after this guy alone?'

She shrugged. 'In that case we go back to the hotel - and leave Billy to it. That's your choice. Either you let me do this alone, or we don't do it.'

'But -'

'No man can defeat Billy. You can't kill him - you can't get close enough without risking him touching you. This one has to be done by the womenfolk… so what's it gonna be?' She folded her arms and quirked an eyebrow at him.

He sighed, and hung his head. He scuffed his feet along the ground. 'It's my fault this guy is loose, killin' people, Cordelia, I have to stop him.'

'It isn't your fault he's free - he's free because skanky, evil Lilah arranged for him to be freed. If she hadn't used you and Angel, she would have done something else. Now - because you feel guilty - I'm willing to hunt him down and take him out for you. But I'm not taking you along. I'm not in any danger from Billy, he doesn't hurt women himself.'

'But…'

'I know you don't want me to get hurt,' she interrupted him again. 'I know you want to protect me. Believe me - you _cannot_ protect me by coming with me. You can only keep me safe by staying away. Do you believe I can kill him by myself?'

He nodded, but he still didn't look at her. She reached out to him. 'What's wrong?'

'You're havin' to rescue me again,' he told her, shaking his head.

'When did I last "rescue" you?' her tone was dismissive.

He shuffled his feet again. 'You know what I mean - it's always me...'

'This again?' she sounded even more dismissive. 'Didn't I tell you? We look out for each other. You have saved me _so_ many times. Sometimes I save you. Sometimes Angel gets his body stolen by little magic pensioners and we all have to save him. Our lives our not like other peoples'.'

'He only took Angel's body 'cause he thought mine wasn't good enough,' Doyle muttered.

'He was wrong,' Cordelia told him. 'But that's not the point. I swear - I will get in some horrible trouble any week now, and you can go all superhero and save me. But this week, it's my turn - because you can't go near Billy - and _Good God_ Angel must not be allowed within a ten mile radius of him.'

That made Doyle smile a sad smile. He exhaled, heavily. 'I guess… I guess I'll try and contact the big man and tell him to stay away. You… take the crossbow,' he handed it to her. 'Just shoot him, yeah? Don't get close, don't linger - don't even talk to him. Just shoot him and go, right?'

'Alright.'

'And - Princess - try to shoot him somewhere there aren't any cameras...or witnesses.'

'I'll bear that in mind,' she smiled, and wrapped one arm around her boyfriend in a brief hug, and kissed him. 'You OK?' she asked.

'No. But there's not much I can do about it… it's that whole powerless thing again. Come back safe?'

She nodded, and then turned and left. Doyle watched her go, feeling a tightness in his chest and the weight of the world on his shoulders. He was sending the woman he loved out to commit murder for him, because he couldn't do it himself, and he felt too guilty about Billy to just go back to the hotel and forget about him. He knew she was willing to do this for him, but he couldn't help but feel he was just giving himself more things to feel guilty about - storing up more misery and shame for the future, once this was all done. He was good at that.

Once she was out of sight, and the sound of her tapping heels had faded away, he sighed heavily, shook his head once more, and then took out his phone to try and ring Angel.

* * *

Wes peered down the microscope at his sample of Billy's blood, and frowned. He called Fred over for a look, to ask her opinion. She brushed against him as she peered down the microscope. She stood very close to him, he could feel her warmth and scent her perfume. She had on a blue dress, with thin straps, and as she had moved past him it had been her bare skin that had grazed against him. He felt his breath grow short, as he watched her.

'Looks to me as if some of the red blood cells are kind of supercharged,' she said, looking up and stepping away again. The fabric of her skirt brushed against him this time, and he felt the emptiness of where she had stood. It was cold - and he didn't like it.

'Exactly what I thought,' he told her. 'That would probably be from Billy's demon lineage.'

'So, however Billy is putting the mojo on people, the power seems to be in his blood,' Fred mused. 'Which means it could also be in his sweat or saliva or even his touch.'

Wesley had leaned forward to look back down the microscope. He was still examining the specimen when he next spoke. 'Speaking of saliva, where are Cordelia and Doyle?'

Fred began to laugh, 'how did you get to them from 'speaking of saliva'? What does saliva have…'

'It's a simple question.' His voice was curt and abrupt. He had asked a question and he wanted to know the answer. If she was going to tease him by brushing up against him in her little dress and then remove her warmth by stepping away - then she had better answer quickly. He was in no mood to be trifled with - not by a tease. 'Where are Cordelia and Doyle?' he repeated.

Fred bit her lip. She had promised Cordy to stay quiet - but she didn't want to lie to Wesley. 'I - I think they went out.'

'Out?'

Fred nodded.

'Did they happen to mention where?'

'Um - Cordelia said - she said they had an errand to run.' It wasn't exactly a lie - Cordelia _had_ said that.

'So when you say you "think" she went out, you mean you "know" she did, because you spoke to her?' She was a liar, as well as a tease - and his disappointment and anger were audible in his voice.

'I -I suppose.'

Caught out in her lie, she was unsure what to say. Her hesitance made him despise her. She couldn't just give a straight answer. She was two faced. Like all of her sex, really.

' _Suppose?_ ' he asked. The warning was unmistakable. She would have to admit her wrongdoing now - and she did.

'I - I did. Yes I did.'

She sounded nervous. Cowardice. That was another trait of the weaker sex. He smiled at her - but a warning smile. 'Good.' He leaned forward and looked into his microscope. He would have to put it right. She was a feeble minded woman - she needed to be told how it was, she couldn't be expected to just know. She hadn't the rationality or logic of a man. He would spell it out, so even a woman could understand where she stood. 'Lie to me again, and we're going to have a problem.'

Fred just stared at him.


	23. Billy: Part Three

As the ringtone turned into the answer phone message, Doyle clicked the button to shut off his call and then tried again. He had rung Angel seven times already - and the vampire wasn't answering. He cursed under his breath, as he listened to the ringing down the line, 'c'mon man - pick up, pick up.' He had already left a message. He'd sent a text message - not that he thought Angel knew how to work his text messaging, but it was worth a shot.

He desperately needed to call the vampire off from going after Billy. No one could afford for Angel, of all people, to get infected by Billy's misogyny - and as Cordelia was hunting the young man down, it was really important that a possessed Angel not get in her way. But there was no answer. It went to the machine again. Doyle cursed again - and then shut off the call and hit redial.

* * *

Fred made a decision - and decided to get the hell out of there. Quietly, she moved around Wesley's desk and made for the door, whilst the watcher was still staring down the microscope.

'Where are you going?' his sharp voice rapped out and, when she glanced back, she saw he hadn't even looked up. He had simply sensed her leaving his side.

'Oh - uh - I was just gonna ring Cordelia, find out where she'd got to…' she extemporised.

'That's not necessary,' Wesley replied, finally looking up at her.

'It's not?' her heart sank.

'No - sit down.'

Her heart sank even further, as she did as she was told and sat down in the chair opposite him. 'It'll just…'

But he didn't want to know. 'There's something we need to discuss,' he said to her.

She glanced longingly at the door and then back at him. 'I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Doyle and Cordy leaving, really I am,' she said - once more casting a glance at her escape route.

He held a hand up, 'pfft, we're past that! I've put it behind me.' He got up and walked around his desk and then leaned back on the front of it, so he was mere inches away from Fred. She inhaled, and tensed up - not daring to breathe out - wanting to keep herself wound tight and ready to flee. 'However, we are going to have to make some changes around here,' he folded his arms and peered down at her.

'Change - can be good - I guess,' she agreed, hesitantly.

'Like no more of these provocative little outfits you wear,' he said, leaning forward and twanging the thin strap of her dress. He then slid the strap off her shoulder. Quickly, she slid it right back up again.

'Provocative?' she asked. It was a cotton sun dress - she lived in L.A. It was about 80 degrees out, even in the dark. It was perfectly sensible clothing to be wearing in the circumstances.

Wesley leaned back again. 'Maybe mommy and daddy never told you that men - _grown_ men - are wired a certain way.' He leaned back in again, so he could whisper to her - her eyes widened in fear, as she heard his words. 'You can't be coming in here, day after day, waving it in my face like this.'

'What?' she breathed in disbelief.

'You're almost daring me to take it,' he hissed, 'Is that what you want?'

She jumped out of her chair and took a step back. 'Stop it!' she demanded.

But Wesley stood too, and moved towards her. 'Oh standing - that's what we're doing now, is it?' His voice was mocking. He was mocking her - mocking her fear.

She tried to get the conversation back onto firmer, saner ground - but she continued to back away. 'This conversation is making me very uncomfortable.'

'Oh! You're uncomfortable? That's rich! How do you think I feel? What do you think it's like for me with you smelling the way you do?'

'Wesley, please…'

He stalked closer to her, even as she backed towards the door - dogging her steps. 'You think you can taunt a man and get away with it? You brush up close, bat your eyes - and then when our backs are turned, you _laugh_ at us!'

He was angry because he thought she would laugh at him. She was fearful for her safety, afraid for her life, because of his anger - and his anger was caused at the mere thought of being laughed at? Margaret Atwood was right. But she tried to appease him - she didn't know what else to do, trapped as she was. 'No -' she shook her head, 'I would never…'

'Humiliate us.' He was right on top of her now, and she froze up. 'You think you can do anything you please because you're connected to life? because you bleed?' She shook her head, but he swung his hand and slapped her across the face. She fell to the floor, and he towered above her. 'I'll show you blood.'

She scrambled to her feet and fled from the office, running for the side doors. But he had longer limbs - a longer stride and a longer reach - and before she could get the door open, he had caught her. He grabbed her by her hair and threw her backwards. 'What do you tell a woman who has two black eyes?' he asked her, before throwing her onto the ground. She stared back up at him. 'Nothing you haven't told her twice before,' he said.

She got to her feet, again, and this time ran up the stairs. Wesley watched her go, for a moment, shaking his head. 'No sense of humour.' He pulled off his tie, rolled his shoulders - as if preparing his muscles to run a race - and then his eyes fell on the open weapons cabinet ...

* * *

Dylan had sent all his friends home after Billy had been there, he just hadn't been in the party mood anymore. There was a knock at his door - another one - and, warily, he went to open it. He kept the safety chain on, though, so the door only opened a crack. A tall, dark guy with a prominent brow and a deep scowl stood on the other side. 'I'm looking for Billy Blim?' Angel said.

'You a friend of his?'

'Actually I'm looking to kill the bastard.'

'Oh.' Dylan took the chain off and pulled the door wide open, 'come on in, then.'

Angel stepped over the threshold and glanced around at the deserted suite. 'Is he here?'

But Dylan answered in the negative. He had been and gone. He had only been looking for some fun money - and frankly, Dylan was willing to give his cousin whatever it took to get rid of him. The vampire asked how come everything was OK, if Billy had truly been there - he had been expecting blood. But there were rules to follow around Billy, it seemed. Everyone in the Blim family knew the rules - it was how they avoided incidents. They never touched him, kept him away from pets, never left him alone with their girlfriends, anything Billy wanted - they just left on the table and then backed away.

'So - explain something to me,' Angel said, 'how come you let me in when I told you I was here to kill your cousin.'

'You're Angel right?'

'Did Billy mention me?' the vampire looked confused, he couldn't see why his name should have come up at all.

But Dylan shook his head again. 'No there was a chick here. She was cute. Brunette. Well, she said that some melodramatic guy named Angel would eventually show up.'

'Cordelia…' Angel gasped, his face took on a worried expression '... _thinks I'm melodramatic?_ ' his tone was injured. He shook his head, 'wait - was she alone? There wasn't a guy with her; short, Irish, loud shirt?'

'Nope - just the pretty lady.'

Angel looked confused, and gazed around the room, 'this doesn't make sense - there must be some reason…' he gesticulated as he talked, using his hands to help him think through and act out the problems.

'You know,' Dylan watched him, 'I think Cordelia has a point, just from watching you, bro - you're a big drama queen.'

Angel suddenly lunged and grabbed the other man by the lapels. Dylan looked down at where he was held in place. 'See - melodrama.' His voice was calm.

Angel's was less so. 'This isn't melodrama - melodrama is …' he cut himself off, 'just tell me where Billy is going.'

'Santa Monica.' Dylan told him, 'we have a plane there. Billy wants to fly someplace. I don't know where,Vancouver, Tahiti - he didn't say. Hopefully far away.

* * *

As Angel left Dylan's place, he took his cell out - hoping to ring Cordelia and tell her to stay the hell away from Billy. He frowned when he saw the all the missed calls on his screen - Doyle had rung him nearly ten times. And there was a weird little envelope at the top of the screen, he didn't know what that meant, or what he was supposed to do with it.

He ignored the missed calls, and rang Cordelia instead. She didn't pick up. 'Cordy - it's me,' he said after the beep, 'I'm coming to get you - do not engage with Billy - do you understand me? Stay away from him … I don't know what you're playing at, but stay away from him.'

As he hung up, his own phone began to ring, and he answered it without checking the number. 'Cordelia?'

'Angel, man, where've y' been. I've been ringin' y' for ages!' - Doyle.

'Doyle - look - I don't have time right now, Billy is headed to an airfield in Santa Monica, he's looking to escape the city. I've got to get to him.'

'That's what I've been trying to ring you about, man, Y' can't just go chargin' in there.' The half demon sounded exasperated.

'Cordelia's gone after him.'

'I know.'

_'You know?_ ' He was incredulous. 'Why did you let her? I need to get to…'

'Angel,' Doyle tried to interrupt.

'...her, before she gets herself into…'

'ANGEL!' Doyle yelled the vampire's name, bringing him to a halt mid flow. ' _Listen to me!_ You cannot go after Billy - it's too dangerous.'

'Too dangerous for me but not for Cordy?'

'Exactly, man - Billy's power - it only affects men - makes 'em crazy. And then forces them to beat up and kill women. He's nothin' special against Cordelia - just a guy - and she's a trained fighter, she can handle herself. But if either of us are there… if he touches either one of us, it's _us_ that will kill Cordelia - not him. It has to be her, bud. It has to be.'

'No.'

'Angel -'

' _No!_ Billy's human - at least mostly, he is - and you've sent Cordelia off to go and take a human life?'

'I had no choice…' Doyle sounded uncomfortable. 'Billy needs to die, and I can't do it. And I'd only put Cordelia in danger by bein' there with her.'

'You're wrong,' Angel told him, 'Cordelia _cannot_ be allowed to take a human life. I'm going to protect her from that.' And without saying another word, he clicked his phone shut, disconnecting his call. His scowl was even deeper and more prominent than usual, as he made his way to the airfield in Santa Monica.

* * *

Wesley climbed the main stairs of the Hyperion, 'Fred?' he glanced upwards and then took the next staircase, leading to the floor above. The blade of the battle axe he carried glinted in the darkness. 'Fred? I know what you're doing. What you're up to. Luring me,' he began to walk down the hallway. 'Forcing me to find you … Oh it's such a dog and pony show. You beguile me with your girlish ways.' He stopped at a door and pushed it open with his axe. When it swung wide, meeting no resistance, he left it and continued on his way.

'I pursue you.' He pushed open the next door. It similarly met no resistance, and he left it alone. 'But you never give over do you? You just keep laughing and running.' He pushed open the next door, it too opened easily. 'Well, guess what, my love? I'm not some downy faced schoolboy.' He pushed open the next door. This one stuck fast - unable to open because of the safety chain that held it in place. Wesley smiled grimly to himself. 'I'm a man,' he said.

* * *

Gunn entered the lobby, chewing on the burrito he had stopped off to buy on the way home - he had got some tacos for Fred, as well - and he wondered where she was. As he walked past the sofa, he heard a loud bang come from one of the upper floors. He glanced upward, 'Wes?' he called out, 'Fred? You guys here?' There was no reply, and he shrugged and walked into Wes' office, still chewing his burrito.

* * *

Wesley kicked the door down and strode into the room. It was one of the abandoned ones, one of the ones nobody ever went in. it had lain dark and deserted since the hotel had closed its doors in the 1970s. He peered around the gloom. She must be in there. He could sense her - practically smell her. But he couldn't see her. 'You can't come out into the open can you?' he called, 'no, you hide - you deceive.' The blade of his axe was shining brightly in the moonlight that streamed in through the window.

'It's nothing new,' he told her - wherever she was, 'it goes all the way back to Eve. You and the serpent plotting behind our backs.' He put on a mocking falsetto, 'Here, honey, eat this. It's just an apple.' His voice returned to its deeper growl. 'That's the problem with your sex. You're all weak, and you're all dirty - and you won't be satisfied until you've brought each and every one of us out of the garden and down into the muck with you.' His voice had got angrier, and his words faster, as he spoke. As he finished, he swung his axe, smashing it into a chair. It broke apart, and clattered to the ground.

Lying beneath the bed, Fred gasped - and immediately tried to smother it, choking off the sound. But it was too late. He'd heard. He stood up, straight, and looked around the room - searching for the source of the noise. He walked over to the bed. Fred lay on the floor and watched his feet approach her hiding place.

She gasped, again, as the mattress was suddenly lifted off the bed and thrown to the side. It flumped against the wall, and fell down. Wesley peered through the bed slats, down at the woman hiding underneath. Then he crouched down, reached out and yanked her upwards. She whimpered, as she was pulled from safety, and held in his grasp. 'Why do you make me do this to you?' he asked.

* * *

Down in the office, Gunn looked up again, as he heard the sound of something large getting tossed around upstairs. Whatever it was, it sounded like it had hit the wall and then the floor. Someone was up there, something was going down. He put down his burrito, and the funny, red hand print that he had been playing with, and went to investigate.

* * *

Wesley leaned in towards Fred, trying to force her into a kiss. But he suddenly pulled back, in pain. She had only been able to find one weapon under the bed, but she was now using it to the best of her ability. She drove the rusty nail she had hidden in her hand deep into Wesley's shoulder. As he released his grasp slightly, and looked down at the source of the sudden pain, she twisted in his arms and kneed him hard in the groin. He doubled over, grunting, and Fred ran from the room.

* * *

A small airplane slowly taxied down the runway of the private airfield. Billy stood on the tarmac, his back to his own jet - which was being readied, and looked up at the stars.

Behind him, Cordelia stepped out from behind the nose of Billy's plane and looked at the man in front of her. 'Billy?' she asked. He turned to look at her.

He smiled - almost, pleasantly. 'Yeah - do I know you?'

'No, but I thought, seeing the things you've got up to, since my boyfriend was tortured to get you released from hell, I'd like to introduce myself,' she tasered him to the ground, 'before I send you back there. I'm Cordelia Chase. And I will be your executioner this evening.'

* * *

Doyle stared at his phone in frustration, once the line went dead. Angel was going after Cordelia. Which meant that Angel was in danger of getting infected by Billy. Which meant that Cordelia was in danger from Angel - and the great pigheaded lump of champ sandwich couldn't even see that. The Irishman swore to himself, under his breath… He trusted Cordy to get the job done - he knew she could kill Billy and bring all this to an end, he absolutely believed she could do that. But he didn't believe she was a match for an infected and angry Angel. Angel would barrel in there to protect Cordelia - when it was not his job to do so - and would thus endanger her.

Had Doyle been wrong to let Cordelia talk him out of going along with her? He genuinely didn't think he was. Of course his first instinct, his own desire, was to be at Cordelia's side - to protect her, both from Billy and from having to kill a human. But she was right when she said the only way he could protect her from Billy was by staying well away. It was hard to be left out, to be useless and not needed - especially when this was a revenge mission for what had been done to him in the first place - but he had to put those feelings to one side. It mattered far more that Cordelia _was_ safe - not that he could pretend he was keeping her safe by being there with her. He had to let his own ego and damaged sense of masculinity slide this time.

But Angel complicated matters. Because when Angel tried to kill Billy, then that young man would almost certainly lay his whammy on the vampire - and then Angel would forget about killing his target and would instead kill Cordy. And that was something that Doyle absolutely could not allow to happen - not whilst there was still breath in his body. Sure, he didn't really think he was a match for Angel, either, but maybe the couple stood a better chance if they were together. He swore again.

There was no way he would have broken his promise and gone after Cordelia, if it was just Billy she was facing. But he had promised nothing about not protecting her from Angel. She may be angry with him when she saw him there - and he couldn't blame her; even if he was careful, he was still taking a huge risk with her life. But it was a far, far bigger risk to her life not to go. He would have to just stay as far away from Billy as humanly possible, and concentrate only on Angel, if and when it became necessary to put the vampire down.

He regretted giving the crossbow to Cordelia, now. This would have been a very good time to have a long range weapon. He could have killed Angel from a distance and not gone anywhere near Billy. He supposed he should feel more guilty about the way he was heading off with the full intention of murdering his best friend, if necessary. But the big, dumb jerk had brought this on himself - there was nothing Doyle could do about that. If he didn't kill Angel before he killed Cordelia, he'd only have to kill him afterwards - might as well save a life, and himself a whole world of pain, and nip this thing in the bud.

He hailed a cab, and gave the Santa Monica airfield address to the driver.

* * *

Fred had run up to next level, but she knew Wesley could not be far behind. 'I'm still here,' his voice floated through the air. She stopped and turned back. She saw the outline of him - silhouetted at the end of the hallway, his axe held in readiness.'I don't run away, like a girl,' he said, 'I see things through.'

She turned and ran again - finding the next staircase leading upward - leading to the top level. She had never been this high before, the top levels of the hotel were mostly abandoned and derelict. Wesley watched her go - the wheels in his mind turned slowly, as he decided how best to solve the problem - which was the best way to catch the rabbit in the snare? This would take logic; he needed to be clever, rational, thoughtful. Not like a woman - all emotion and reaction. Careful forethought and planning - that was why he would win, in the end. Why his sex would always win in the end. Well - the logic - and the brute strength. And the axe - one mustn't forget the axe.

...

Fred stumbled as she ran, falling to her hands and knees. She checked behind her for Wesley, backing away on all fours - before scrambling to her feet again. She took a step, and then ran straight into the solid mass of Gunn. He clapped his hand around her mouth to prevent her from screaming. 'Shh,' he hushed her. Then he removed his hand from her mouth and wrapped his arm around her. She felt her own body quiver with relief, as she felt his reassuring, protective bulk surround her. He pulled her into a dark corner, and she gladly followed him.

* * *

Cordelia stared down at the crumpled man on the floor - the man she had put on the floor. He had been the cause of so much pain - to Doyle, guilt for Angel, those poor dead women, that beaten cop… he needed to be stopped. She would stop him. This was what she had been training for.

Billy looked back at her, 'you're going to kill me?'

'You think I can't?' her eyes issued a challenge. 'Is that because you're so bad? Or because I'm a woman?'

'You think I hate you because you're a woman? I don't - I don't hate women.' He got to his feet, 'I mean sure, you're all whores who sell yourselves for money and prestige. But guys are just as bad. Maybe even worse. I mean they're willing to throw away careers or families or even lives for what's under your skirt.'

She levelled her crossbow at him, 'I'm wearing pants.'

'So you can dress like a man,' he taunted, 'talk like a man?' he smiled, 'does that make you feel superior?'

'Actually I feel superior because I have an arrow pointed at your jugular.' Her hand was rock steady, and her eyes never left his. If he could get over his own prejudices enough to actually notice - he would realise he was in the presence of someone really formidable. Someone who was willing to stop him, someone who wasn't afraid of him or what he might do - someone who had confidence in their own ability to get the job done. She let her disdain for him drip into every one of her next words. 'And the irony of using a phallic shaped weapon? Not lost on me.'

'You don't have the nerve to do it.' He was basing that on nothing but his own disregard for her sex. He had failed to notice the steel determination in her eyes.

She stepped closer, so that the tip of the arrow was pressing into his neck. 'Guess again.'

She began to squeeze the trigger. And then she felt the crossbow being knocked out of the way. Angel pushed her back, and stepped in between the two of them. 'I can't let you do it, Cordelia.'

Billy began to laugh, 'you saved me, again!' he said to the vampire, 'I knew you would!'

'Angel! You know what he is!'

Angel turned to look at her. She had killed plenty of demons in her short life, sure - but Billy was different. This was a step beyond anything she'd done before, and a step he was not willing to let her take. She wanted Billy killed. He deserved to be killed. So Angel would do it. 'Yeah, I know what he is,' he turned back to Billy, 'which is why I'm gonna waste this piece of garbage myself.'

He hauled back, to hit the young man, but Cordelia grabbed his arm. 'He can't hurt me!' she cried.

...

The taxi arrived at the airfield. Doyle threw some bills at the driver and then began to scramble out of the car. But, just as he was getting the door open - he saw Billy suddenly lunge forward, and clamp both hands around Angel's face.

...

'No, I won't hurt her,' Billy cried, ' _I_ won't hurt her at all.'

Angel pushed the man away from himself, but, visible even from the taxi - two flaming red hand marks were imprinted on Angel's cheeks. After a moment, they faded away. Angel and Cordelia stared at each other. Billy began to laugh. Doyle got the car door open, and began to run...


	24. Billy: Part Four

Gunn and Fred hurried down the corridor. The first door the street fighter tried was locked, so he ushered Fred onward and they tried the next one. This door swung open, leading into another derelict room. 'Here,' he pushed her inside. Then he shut the door, and heaved the dresser over so it was blocking the entrance. Fred just stood back and watched him, breathing heavily as she tried to process everything that had happened.

'Now what the hell happened to Wesley?' Gunn asked, piling up more furniture in front of the door.

'Somehow he got infected,' she told him. She shook her head, 'all I can figure is, it must have happened while he was working with Billy's blood from the hand print.'

Gunn froze, and then turned slowly to look at her. 'You mean, that - that - fingerpainty looking hand print is Billy's blood?'

Fred nodded.

'So you're saying that Wes turned into a psycho killer 'cause of the bloody hand print that - I picked up and looked at?'

Fred's face crumpled, 'well, when you put it that way, it kinda worries me.'

Gunn began to pull the furniture back away from the door. 'I better get out of here,' he began to push the dresser away, 'lock the door behind me.'

There was a sudden crashing sound from outside, as something sharp hit the door. The pair of them jumped and Fred let out a small scream. Gunn immediately pushed the dresser back into place. Out in the hall, Wesley began to use his axe to chop his way through the door.

Throwing the furniture back on top of the dresser, Gunn glanced around the room - his eyes wide as he searched for any kind of inspiration. 'Well - maybe we - uh- just go to plan B.'

The axe hit the door again, Wesley pulled it free and took another swing. The wood began to splinter.

Fred took a step backwards, moving away from the buckling door. But she stepped on a rotten patch of floorboard, and her foot plunged through the floor. She screamed; and Gunn leapt forward to catch her, before she could fall through. He pulled her away, further into the room - away from the weakened floorboards.

Wesley still hacked at the door.

'Oh God,' murmured Fred, as the damage the axe was doing became visible on her own side. He hacked at the door again. It would not be long before he broke through. You know when you said we go to plan B?' Fred asked Gunn, 'what's plan B?'

'Ah - plan B.' He let go of Fred and began to search the room, '..plan B.'

'Charles?'

Her voice was rising and wavering in panic. It made it difficult for him to think. She needed to shut up if she wanted him to get the job done. He would shut her up. He span around to face her, 'plan B is where if you don't stop whining I bash in your…' he stopped himself. His eyes went wide with horror. 'Oh, God!'

* * *

Angel stood between Cordelia and Billy, he began to inch backwards. 'Cordy - get out of here.'

She looked at him, fearfully, and began to back away herself, 'you should have just let me…'

He glanced over his shoulder, 'GET OUT!' he yelled. She jumped. Across the tarmac, Doyle heard the yelling and sped up.

'Angel - you have to fight this,' Cordelia told the vampire.

But Billy stepped closer to Angel, 'don't fight it,' he told him, 'feel it. You can, can't you? All that rage, all that hatred bubbling to the surface.' He glanced over at Cordy and smirked, 'you know, I've never done this to a vampire before, should be quite entertaining.'

'Cordelia,' Angel said quietly, 'please go.'

And then Doyle was there, panting and out of breath, 'c'mon Cordy - y' tried, he ruined it. We need to leave.' He kept a wary eye on Billy, keeping himself slightly behind Cordelia - even as he tugged at her to go - so that the young man couldn't touch him.

Cordelia glanced down at where he was plucking at her elbow, and then back up at Angel's face. 'We wanted to finish this,' she said to him, 'why did you have to get in the way?'

'Now's maybe not the time for recriminations, Cordy,' Doyle said, hauling at her to drag her away - though she continued to resist. 'If Billy doesn't kill him, then we'll talk about the consequences of heroing into a situation and puttin' everyone in danger, later … but that's a chat for another day, yeah? C'mon.' He hauled again, and Cordelia stumbled backwards and began to follow him. He looked at Angel one last time, 'we'll talk later,' his voice made it clear that this would not be a friendly chat.

But Angel began to laugh; a chilling, mocking sort of laugh. 'You think we're gonna talk later - about how I don't know how to do my job?' He took a step towards the couple.

'Cordelia, run,' Doyle said. She took a few steps, but then stopped when she realised that he wasn't running with her. He had stood his ground and was glaring at the vampire.

'You think I've put everyone in danger - that I don't know what I'm doing?' Angel was getting right into his face, towering over the much shorter man - menacing him. 'But the truth is, Doyle, like always - you have no idea what you're talking about. Because this…' he turned around and slugged Billy, ' _stain_ has got no power over me.'

From her position, a few feet away, Cordelia sighed a deep, ragged breath of relief, as she realised that Angel had not been infected. Or he had successfully fought it. Either way - he wasn't evil. He was pounding on Billy, who was giving it right back.

Doyle backed away from the fight, ever so slightly, so he was level with Cordelia. The blood was ringing in his ears. Billy hadn't affected Angel… Billy's powers didn't work on Angel. Doyle had had no need to come rushing to Cordelia's rescue, after all...

* * *

Gunn picked up a chair and smashed it against the wall, so it broke into pieces.

'Charles, you're scaring me!'

He turned and advanced on her, the chair leg now held in his hand. She jumped back and screamed, but he simply held it out to her. 'Take this and knock me out,' he said to her, 'knock me out.' He could feel the rage building inside of him, feel the blood pounding through his veins - it seemed to go in rhythm with Wesley's swinging at the door. But he fought to keep a clear head for as long as he could. This wasn't him - and it was important that he made Fred safe before he lost himself to the demonic anger.

She looked at him, aghast, 'you want me to hit you?'

He forced the chair leg into her hands. 'Yes,'

'I can't!'

Stupid woman - did she not understand how important this was? Was she really so weak that she wouldn't defend herself? People who wouldn't defend themselves deserved everything they got. He'd show her. He'd make her understand the price of her weakness...

No. He took a breath and shook his head, he could hang on a bit longer. 'You might want to!' he told her. This was getting desperate. She needed to act now - or by god he would not be responsible…

'HIT ME!' he yelled at her, both angry and desperate. Wesley continued to hack at the door. The sound was enraging him, the sight of tiny, trembling, little Fred stood in front of him - clutching a weapon she hadn't the courage to use - was enraging him.

'Charles, please!'

'Charles, please!' he repeated back to her, his voice mocking her. She wouldn't help herself - what happened next would be her fault. He had warned, but dammit she wouldn't listen. She never listened. She just whined and moaned and trembled and pleaded. 'Fine. Then give it back to me so I can smash your _stupid_ head in with it. Gimme the damn chair leg!'

He reached out for it, but Fred hauled back and brought her weapon crashing down on his skull. It was a nasty blow, and he was felled. He dropped to his knees, and swayed. But he was not yet out. He glared up at her, she could see the way his eyes were clouded with anger - almost red with hatred. 'You're gonna pay for that,' he growled.

She swung again - and he was knocked out cold. He lay face down on the floor, unmoving - and Fred breathed a small sigh of relief, and threw the chair leg to one side. But then she jumped back again, and screamed, as Wesley's axe finally managed to break through the door.

* * *

Angel and Billy continued to fight. Doyle and Cordy backed away. Angel threw Billy to the ground and began to advance on him, but the young man rolled when he hit the ground and came up on all fours. He then slammed his fists on the tarmac. A shock wave radiated out from his arms, through the ground, and then back into him. The floor began to crack beneath him and his hands glowed bright red. The red faded from his hands, and travelled up his arms - and then his eyes flashed yellow. When Angel got to him, it was Billy, this time, who was able to send his opponent flying. Whatever he had done, whatever power he had sourced from the earth, he was now by far the stronger of the two. And it looked like Angel would lose.

Doyle and Cordelia watched on in horror. 'Doyle,' she said to him, 'run.'

'But…'

'I'm going to help Angel - get out of here!'

Doyle looked at the supercharged Billy, at the way he glowed in fury - and dread filled his heart at the thought of some of that infecting himself - and being turned on Cordelia. He nodded and began to leave.

Cordelia picked up her fallen crossbow.

As Doyle fled, he ran headlong into someone just arriving at the airfield. He gaped at them in disbelief, 'what are you doing here?'

* * *

Fred looked around the room. Wesley was still battering away at the door - though his axe had already broken through to her side. She had mere moments - if that - to come up with a plan. He would be in here, any second now, and then that axe would be used against her.

* * *

Cordelia aimed her crossbow - but she couldn't get a clean shot. Billy and Angel were moving around too much. They kept trading places as they traded blows - and she worried that she would inadvertently injure her friend if she misfired. But she had to do something… Angel was losing.

And then Angel was able to duck in between Billy's fist and get into his space - just for a moment, but it was enough. He threw Billy away from himself so that that there was clear space between them. Angel backed away - and Cordelia had her shot. She squeezed the trigger.

BLAM BLAM. Two gunshots suddenly fired out of nowhere. Billy's body jerked backwards, where he was hit in the chest, he shuddered and then fell to the floor. He was still. Cordelia relaxed her trigger finger, the bolt still in the bow. As she lowered her crossbow, she looked towards the source of the noise - and saw Lilah lowering a pistol. Doyle stood beside her, looking a little shell shocked.

Angel looked across at Lilah, and then down at Billy. Lilah looked back at him, and then glanced sidewards at Doyle. Doyle stared up at her. And then she turned and left - without a word.

Cordelia made her way over to Angel - and Doyle watched the two of them stare down at Billy - and then support each other, as they walked back to Angel's car.

* * *

Wesley had chopped through the wood of the door, and had managed to force his arm through the hole so that he could unlock the door from the inside. Now, he was pushing against it, edging the dresser away inch by inch - forcing his way in.

Once the gap was big enough, he squeezed through it and entered the room. He looked around. It seemed deserted - save for Gunn, face down and knocked unconscious on the floor. There was no sign of Fred. But she had to be here. There was no possible escape from the room, on the uppermost floor, which she had so foolishly run to and locked herself inside. She was trapped like a rat in a cage. Like the vermin she was, like all her sex were. It was just a case of discovering her hiding place. And that wouldn't be hard. Women were creatures of habit - so simple, so predictable.

'Would you like to hear my theory, Fred?' he spoke aloud into the seemingly empty room. 'It's about how stupid you are. I believe that after five years of living in a cave, you'll instinctively retreat to small, dark places, rather than run outside - where you'd be safe.'

The floor creaked underneath his feet, and he glanced down. At some point the rotten floorboards had been covered with a tarp, rather than fix up the derelict room. He skirted the tarp and made his way to the closet. 'Let's finish this,' he said, yanking the door of the closet open.

But the wardrobe was empty. His axe, raised to swing, hit against thin air. And then he saw her. Reflected in the mirror on the inside of the closet door. The little shrew was behind him. She had tricked him! Made him believe that she would hide in an enclosed space and then left him looking a fool. Like the way she would use her wiles to make him believe that she wanted him, that she desired him - and then she would laugh when he tried to pursue her. Oh this was all a game to her. It was all a game to all of them. Men were their playthings - and men were hopeless against them. Their minds were crooked and twisted, they hid in shadows and dealt in illusions. How could a man, with a mind as straight as an arrow - a sense of justice, and morality, hope to counter such treacherous creatures?

There was only one way. The way in which men were strong. Women were devious, yes - but men were strong. And brute strength would always win. It could always be used to teach a lesson when the weaker sex let their trickery run out of hand. He would teach her that lesson now - and she would not forget it. He turned to look at her, and raised his axe once more.

'I'm sorry, Wesley,' she said. 'You were right about me liking dark places to hide in. But you forgot … I also like to build things…' She yanked down on a rope that hung beside her, and a fire extinguisher came swinging out of nowhere, and smacked him full in the face. He stumbled backwards - onto the tarp - and then fell through the broken floorboards that had nearly claimed Fred just a few minutes before. He crashed through the floor and tumbled down into the room below.

Fred edged towards the hole - careful to balance her weight evenly - and peered down through the gap. She saw him lying out, sprawled on the floor beneath her. Like Gunn - he was now unconscious.

* * *

It had been a long and quiet drive home from Santa Monica. Each of them were wrapped up in their own thoughts. Doyle sat in the back seat, and watched Cordelia's short hair stream out behind her in the breeze. She had made him leave. She had seen Angel had not been affected by Billy's power - but still she had made Doyle leave.

In the moment, he had not really questioned it. Billy had been terrifying; as he had glowed red, and sent Angel flying through the air with each blow. The thought of letting the shining scarlet fury infect him, and then unleash itself upon the woman he loved, had been more than argument enough to convince him to run. But now Billy was gone - and the fear of infection only a memory… and Doyle was starting to ask questions - to himself at least.

Why was Cordelia so sure that Doyle would fall victim to Billy, if she had seen that some men could be immune? Did she think Angel was just better than Doyle? Was it - after all the times she had been forced to save him - that she simply believed Doyle was weak? Or did she believe that somewhere, deep down, Doyle hated her? That he would hurt her - even when she trusted Angel not to? He didn't know - and he didn't like not knowing.

In the front seat, Cordelia turned slightly, so she was looking at Angel. Her expression was also thoughtful, pensive, enquiring… and Doyle watched her profile - trying to parse out what was going on in her thoughts.

Angel looked at neither of them. He stared straight ahead, concentrating on the road - giving away nothing.

...

When they returned to the hotel, it was to find Fred locked in her room, with furniture pushed against the door - and Wesley and Gunn unconscious. They coaxed her out of her room, and she told them her story - whilst Doyle poured her a stiff drink. Once they were assured she was OK, she went back to bed, and the three of them went to sort out their unconscious associates.

They found Wesley sprawled out on the floor of a third floor room. Between them, Angel and Doyle manhandled him down the stairs to Cordelia's old room and laid him out on the bed. Cordelia then began to tend to his head wounds - and the men went back upstairs for Gunn.

He was brought down to Doyle's room and, again, Cordelia patched up his head injuries. Then - with nowhere to sleep in the hotel - Doyle and Cordy left for Cordelia's place - and Angel stayed with his two friends until they woke up, and he knew they were alright.

...

In bed that night, Cordelia lay sprawled across Doyle, her head resting against his shoulder and her right arm flung across his chest, in a loose embrace. But beneath her, Doyle lay still and stiff as board - as he stared into the darkness - and worried about all that had transpired that night, and what it meant for them.

* * *

In the Hyperion basement the next day, Cordelia and Angel were training once more. 'I don't get it,' she said to him, as they walked through the steps, 'you're a man, so why didn't Billy's touch affect you?'

'Well maybe because - I'm not human.' They walked side by side, in perfect synchronicity - bringing their swords round and lunging them forwards.

Cordelia began to chuckle. 'Oh right - and a vampire could never be turned into a monster.'

'Well, that thing that Billy brought out in others? The hatred and anger -' they reached the end of their sequence and he turned to face her, 'that's something I lost a long time ago.'

'Even when you were evil?'

He shrugged, 'I never hated my victims. I never killed out of anger. It was always about the pain - and the pleasure.'

'Huh,' Cordy looked thoughtful. 'So I guess you could say you're demonness makes you less petty than humans? Almost noble. I mean - in a twisted, dark and really disturbing kind of way.'

They moved to take up the starting position of a new sequence. 'It's weird,' she said, as they began their steps again, 'I'm getting used to being creeped out and comforted at the same time.'

Angel smiled at her, 'I get that.'

...

At the top of the stairs, Doyle listened to their conversation. He hadn't meant to eavesdrop, but he had been coming down to watch them, and overheard. It didn't seem like a moment he should interrupt - though he wanted to. But he also wanted insight - into what Cordelia was thinking. He should just ask her. He knew that. But here she was, talking about last night with Angel - and Doyle wanted to hear what she said to him, the version she wouldn't filter to spare her boyfriend's feelings.

He wondered about what Angel said - about having lost all that hatred and rage, and tried to apply to it himself. Almost all of the hatred and anger he felt was entirely focused inwards - it was himself he had always hated, not anyone else. It was his demon half, his sense of his own inadequacy - and recently - the knowledge that he couldn't have children, which fuelled his anger. So how would that manifest if Billy had touched him? Would he have turned it on Cordelia? Or would he just be a danger to himself?

He would never know, now. There was no way he could prove that, in this one sense at least, he was just as good as Angel was. But if he wasn't - then he would have to work on it.

He couldn't kid himself, couldn't turn a blind eye - Angel was in love with Cordelia. It was obvious. And Doyle certainly wasn't struggling to understand why. But - now that he had competition - if he wanted to still be good enough that she would choose him over the vampire - then he would have to work on being every bit as good as the vampire - every bit as worthy.

He needed to let go of all his hatred and anger and bitterness. It didn't do him any good. He had got better, over the last two years - but it was still there, his own inferiority complex waiting to drag him back down. Waiting to trip him up and make him screw everything up again. So it had to go. He had to let go of everything from the past, every old resentment needed to be pushed away. He needed to make peace with everything that had ever caused him pain - and he knew one place he could start.

* * *

Wesley sat in his apartment. The sun streamed through the windows - like an ironic counterpoint to his mood. He drank a whisky, and ignored the tap at the door. Then he heard her voice come floating through. 'Wesley? Wesley it's me.'

He got up to open the door, though he hung his head and couldn't look her in the eye. She gasped when she saw his face, and reached out to touch the bruising, 'does that hurt?' But he yanked his face away from her, and kept his eyes low. She lowered her hand. 'Sorry - I left a bunch of messages.'

'Yes - I mean to call, I'm sorry.' His voice became a whisper, 'I am so sorry.'

'Wesley - you gotta come back to work,' she ignored the apology and kept her voice matter of fact. They needed to move on.

'How can I?'

'How can you not? You're the boss - we need you. You took a few days off - that's good, we all did, but now you have to come back.'

'Fred, I tried to kill you.'

'That wasn't you.' Charles wasn't taking it this hard. Sure he'd been sorry, sure he'd apologised - and then they'd laughed at what a good arm she had, until the concussion had made Gunn wince with pain. He had moved forward. But maybe it was easier for him… he had been angry, and frightening - he would have killed her, sure. But he had been able to fight its effects for a little while, able to help her even as the rage built inside of him. And the things he had said… he had said nothing like Wesley. His dark side was far far lighter. He was not left shaken to the core, wondering what kind of man he was. Wesley on the other hand…

'How can we know that?' His voice was despairing. 'Something inside me was forced to the surface. Something primal, something…'

She lost patience. 'Do you wanna kill me?'

'Oh God no.'

She spelled it out to him, 'it wasn't something in you. It was something done to you.' Not that she was sure she really believed that - the difference in Wes and Gunn had been too stark to make her really believe it was purely external. But Wesley had to believe that - because they all had a job to do, and he wasn't doing it right now.

'I don't know what sort of man I am any more.'

Well - that was a side effect of chasing a woman through a hotel with an axe, whilst spouting biblical crap about original sin. But she tried to keep her voice gentle. She had to get through to him - for the good of the team. She still felt there was so little she could offer Angel Investigations - but she could get them their boss back, if she just said the right words. 'I do,' she told him, 'you're a good man. Will I see you back at the office?'

He nodded, sadly, 'yeah.'

'Good,' she turned to leave - and he closed the door behind her. As she walked down the hall, she heard the sound of him beginning to cry. She stopped for a moment - hesitating - but then left him to it, and went home.

* * *

Doyle knocked on the door. Lilah opened it. Her face was still battered and bruised, though she could open her eye now. She looked down at him - she seemed surprised. He'd never seen her surprised, before. 'What?' she demanded.

'I - ah - I wanted to -ah - check that you were OK.'

She took full advantage of having both eyes open, by rolling them. 'Oh please! Spare me!'

'No - it's true, Lilah. It was a good thing y' did, killin' Billy. And I know your firm won't be happy - so it was brave too. I know y' did it for your own reasons but…' he shrugged, 'thanks anyway.'

'Is that it?'

He sighed, 'look, Lilah - I know y' hate me and… I'm sorry. For causin' y' to get y' hand cut off, for smashin' the beacon, for not just disappearin' off to jail like y' wanted - all of it.'

'You forgot the ten thousand dollars you cost me when you didn't die in that gladiator match, and jeopardising the Darla project by filming her kill that actor.'

'Well - I'm sorry for that too. I really am. I'm not tryin' to piss y' off, Lilah. We work for the opposite side, I get it - we're enemies. But does it have to be so personal? I'm sorry I've ruined stuff for y' without meaning to … I've hurt you, you've hurt me - can we just call it quits?'

'But we're still on different sides.'

'I know. We can still be enemies - just does the personal grudge stuff have to be there? Can't we just hate each other for the good old fashioned reason that you're evil and I'm not?'

She raised an eyebrow, 'you're really apologising to me and saying that everything between us is your fault?'

'I piss people off without realisin' - it's my worst fault.'

She laughed. 'Fine - as you accept full responsibility, and I have a new hand, and the Darla situation led to a promotion - apology accepted. Next time I try to kill you - it will be purely for the furtherment of The Senior Partner's plans and not because I enjoy seeing you suffer.'

He nodded. 'I really appreciate that - good meeting.'

She closed the door in his face, and he walked off - already feeling better about himself. He'd talked things out with his arch nemesis, laid his cards on the table - and let go of the anger he had been carrying around for her since she had tried to throw him in jail. It was like a huge weight had been lifted. Sure, everything was her fault really - but it was done, so what did it matter? - Water under the bridge. He was happy to take the blame, if it meant they could move forward.

Now he had to just let go of the other source of anger that he had been carrying from that time. His anger at Angel, for leaving him to it - for abandoning him, for being so wrapped up in Darla to notice the trouble Doyle was in. And once that was gone - he'd work on himself - really come to terms with his half demon side and everything that entailed, including his infertility. He could do this. He smiled to himself, as he walked down the hallway. He could be as good as Angel. He was in control.


	25. Offspring: Part One

_Angelus fled down the sewer tunnels - following the rats as they scurried through the filth. But the monks were not far behind him, he could hear them, sense them. He ran onward, and turned a corner - only to find the way cut off by yet another group of robed holy men. They carried torches and blocked his path. Taking one last turning - he came up against a grate, and used all his vampire strength to heave it open. He let it slam shut behind him - the following monks would not be able to pass that barrier - he was home fre-_

_He stumbled and fell. The tunnel slanted downwards and he rolled all the way to the bottom, and then crashed through the next grate. As he landed on the floor, he heard the click of crossbows being aimed. He gazed upwards, groaning with pain. Another set of monks surrounded him, their arrows pointed straight at him. He was in an underground chamber - their underground chamber - the monks had chased him there deliberately._

_A pair of doors swung open. They must lead to the outside world, because the bright sunlight shone into the gloomy chamber once the doors were open. Angelus cowered away from the light, but he could still feel his skin begin to smoke. A horse and rider came cantering into the room and then reigned in. The doors were shut, and the rider dismounted and handed his horse over to one of the monks. Then he went to speak to the chief monk._

_Angelus listened, as Holtz - the fearsome vampire hunter and the sworn enemy of Angelus and Darla - spoke to the monk in Italian. 'Thank you Monsignor, I am in your debt.'_

_But the monsignor waved away his thanks. He knew what the soulless creature and his sire had done to Holtz's family. They had killed them all - and now the holy men were only too delighted to help Holtz wreak his vengeance upon the vampires._

_Angelus was hauled up, and chained into place. Holtz took a step towards him and began to speak. 'Monsignor Rivalli performed the ceremony when Caroline and I were wed. You remember Caroline?'_

' _Pretty lass - hearty screamer,' Angelus agreed._

' _The good monsignor has since then been excommunicated,' Holtz told him. Rivalli was a traditionalist who clung to the old ways. He had founded his own order - the inquisitore, but it was not heretics they sought and punished. It was vampires. Torture was their speciality. Holtz took a sharp hook and some knives from one of the monks. 'Let's get started shall we?'_

_..._

_As the hours lengthened, Holtz took a break and the monks stepped in where he left off. Their methods were… original, the pain was unbearable. Holtz had a drink, and stared across at the bound vampire. 'I lost you in North Africa,' he said, 'but I knew you would return to Europe. But Rome? Angelus, why in God's name would you come to the seat of all that is holy?'_

' _Darla - she loves the Sistine chapel.' He groaned in pain, 'what do you want Holtz?'_

_Holtz picked up a three pronged claw and examined it, frowning slightly, as he felt the weight of it in his hand and tested the sharpness with his finger. 'I don't want anything,' he replied, after a moment's pause. 'My family is gone. I don't trust you to give me Darla, though I will find her, you know that. My only desire, here, is to see if a thing such as yourself can be made to pay for its sins.'_

_He swung the claw, digging it into there vampire's torso. Angelus cried out in pain. Judging by his lack of reaction, the sound had no effect on Holtz. 'You're a demon,' he said. 'It is your nature to maim and kill. But you were also once a man. If we beat and burn the demon out of your living flesh, will there be anything left?' He ripped the claw out of Angelus' body and then stuck it straight back in again. Once more, the vampire cried out in pain. Once more - Holtz did not react. 'Anything at all? I doubt it. But I'm willing to spend the next fortnight of my life finding out. Either way - you have no soul - you cannot be saved.'_

_..._

_A flaming arrow shot across the room, and buried itself into the chest of one of the monks - who fell to the ground, dead._

' _Sorry it took me so long, darling.'_

_Holtz turned - and then he saw her. She was standing at the mouth of the sewer tunnel, holding a crossbow - a new flaming arrow already loaded. Darla. More wily by far than her idiot boy - it was she that the vampire hunter yearned to catch. The boy was so easily ensnared. But she was elusive, and forever slipped from his grasp. So time and again he vented his frustration against Angelus. And here she was, in the torture chamber - an army of vampires at her back. Her escape would be planned out, Angelus was as good as free, now she was here - and Holtz knew it._

' _Kill them,' Darla commanded her army. The vampires ran at the monks, and the demons and the holy men fell to battle. But the woman herself headed straight for her boy. The monsignor stepped towards her, brandishing a cross, but she simply pushed it aside and then sent him flying across the room. 'No, grazie padre,' she said. And then she was by Angelus, unchaining him._

_The double doors reopened and this time a cart was driven in. Angelus was placed in the back of the wagon, where he lay groaning. Holtz attempted to stop them from leaving but, just like the monsignor, Darla stopped him with one blow. Then she climbed into the back of the cart, and the driver jerked the reigns and set off._

' _Darlin'?' Angelus asked,_

' _Yes?'_

' _Shouldn't we be killin' Holtz right about now?'_

' _We should - but he's like family now. Besides - it's so much more fun just ruining his life.'_

_Angelus leaned in to kiss his sire and, as they embraced, Darla pulled a tarpaulin over their bodies - so they were completely covered, as the cart drove out into the deadly rays of the sun, leaving Holtz behind._

* * *

The public bus, on the Downtown - Hollywood route, came to a stop and the doors opened. 'Right here is fine,' Darla said to the driver, 'thanks for the lift. That didn't take long at all.' She climbed down the steps, cradling her massively pregnant belly. 'And they say there is no public transportation in L.A,' she said to herself, as the doors closed behind her.

Back in the bus, the driver turned around to stare at his passengers. Three of them lay slumped in their seats - twin puncture wounds marking their necks. Four more were huddled in the back. He grabbed his radio and and began to holler over the airwaves. 'Help! We got a code twelve on the 5-8 line. We need help here now, for god's sake. Now!'

Oblivious to the panic she left in her wake, Darla smiled to herself as she crossed the street...

* * *

Cordelia stood in the basement, arranging flowers in a vase, as she waited for her next training session. Angel walked in and smiled when he saw what she was doing, 'what's this?' he asked, indicating the posies.

She shrugged, 'it's so dark and lifeless down here, I thought I'd brighten it up for you. It's not like you can exactly go out and enjoy the sunny fields of nature - but we can still bring a little bloom into your gloom.'

The vampire plucked one of the flowers from the vase and held it to his nose. His smile turned into a look of confusion. 'They're fake.'

Cordelia looked at him like he was crazy, 'well - yeah - you put anything real down here and it would wither and die like that.' She snapped her fingers to demonstrate the speed with which nature would shrivel up if it ever came into contact with the dark avenger and his lair. Angel replaced the flower, his business manager watched him expectantly. 'Thank you, Cordelia?' she prompted.

He began to chuckle, 'you know, I've been around a long time - and I have _never_ met someone quite like you.'

'Well - duh!' There was only one Cordelia Chase! She grinned at him, 'time's a wastin', big guy. Can we do it?' She took on a combative stance and thrust her hand out in a karate chop 'Hi-ya!'

The vampire chuckled, fondly, as he took her through her paces - going over once more what they had learned last time. He urged her not to pull any punches - to not worry about hurting him. She took a swing, and he deflected it, but commended her on technique - encouraging her to go again. She tried once more - and missed again. 'Good!' Angel enthused, 'where's your weight?' He checked, 'balls of your feet?'

She adjusted her weight and swung again. This time her fist made contact and she hit him full in the face. He stumbled backwards and, immediately, Cordelia pulled her fist back and started to apologise. 'Oh God! Oh god - you said that…' Angel straightened back up, and smiled at her. 'Are you OK?' she asked him, her voice concerned - and more than a little guilty.

But Angel just chuckled again, 'I'm a vampire,' he reminded her, 'you can't hurt me.' And then he turned away from her - so she couldn't see his face - and winced, gingerly feeling the bridge of his nose. The girl had a fist of steel!

'You're off your game,' Cordelia said knowledgeably. Angel nodded - he'd accept that. How else could the dark avenger have just been beaten up by cheerleader barbie? 'It's because of the prophecy Wes and Gunn are trying to get their hands on,' she continued, 'you think the end is coming.'

He turned back to face her. 'The end is not coming. Someone is always uncovering some ancient scroll, and they're always saying the same thing: that something terrible is coming. Do you know how many of these things I've seen in my very long life?'

'Four?' she guessed.

'Three,' he admitted - a little sheepish. 'But there's nothing to worry about.'

Cordelia remained unconvinced. She arched an eyebrow at the vampire and asked why - if nothing was wrong - were Wes and Gunn breaking and entering.

She was just relieved Doyle hadn't gone along. She couldn't withstand another legal drama, so soon after the last one. He would be far less likely to wriggle out of a conviction if he were actually caught in the act. But she was relatively sanguine about the prospect of Wes and Gunn going to jail.

'Breaking and entering is such a negative term,' Angel said to her. 'They are simply retrieving some missing pieces from the Nyazian scroll. Just to make sure…'

'That the end is coming,' Cordy interrupted him. She sighed. 'Well if the world does end - me and Doyle are gonna want a day off to go to Disneyland before it's too late.'

'Disneyland?' He raised his hand to his nose again, and felt it once more. He looked at the woman who had hit him so hard. 'Am I swelling?' he asked her.

* * *

Wesley, clad all in black, snuck up to the window and peered in. He reeled off the steps accomplished so far - throwing steaks to distract the dobermans and disabling the alarms. He pulled out a scanner and looked at the display - there were no infrared sensors - so that was something of a lucky break! Next he took out a suction cup and attached it to the window. Now all he needed to do was cut the glass, sneak in the minicam and scan the interior. Once that was proved safe they could disable the locks and bolts on the side door…

Growing bored, Gunn wandered over to the patio door and tried the handle. The door swung open - and the street fighter smirked at the watcher, before stepping inside. Wesley watched him go, and then detached the suction cup, put it back in his bag, and scurried on after his associate.

Gunn was standing just inside - so Wes almost bumped straight into him. When he righted himself, he saw what the other man was staring at. 'Dear God!' he breathed. The room was packed with ornate and expensive weapons - displayed on the wall, priceless mystical artefacts stood on pedestals and - most gruesome of all - severed demon body parts loomed out of every corner.

'Some guys collect old cars, some guys collect…' the street fighter flinched back, as he spotted a misshapen, one eyed, demonic, severed head peering out of a glass case at him. He leaned forward for a closer look, and then moved his head from side to side. 'It's like the eye follows you - wherever you go!'

Wesley wandered over to one of the pedestals - which displayed a small silver bottle. He took the stopper out of the bottle and gave the contents a sniff, before replacing the lid and looking around the room. 'Now - if you were a priceless remnant of the Nyazian scroll - where would you be?'

'If I were priceless…' Gunn said, his eyes scanned the room, 'I'd be in the vault.' He pointed towards the strongbox embedded in the wall.

Wesley looked put out, 'your snitch never said anything about a vault,' he chided - going over to examine it.

'I got a bad feeling about this,' Gunn told him.

'It's just a vault … we'll figure something out.'

'Actually, my bad feeling is more about the man standing behind you, with the large revolver.'

Slowly, Wesley turned around and found himself staring down the barrel of a pistol. 'Move and I kill you,' the man with the gun said. Keeping his firearm trained on the two intruders, the man edged further into the room and then reached for the telephone.

'I hope you're ringing the police,' Wesley said to him. Gunn stared at him like he was mad.

'Damn right I'm calling the police.'

'Good - then you can explain to them why you keep so much GHB on hand.' The watcher returned to the silver bottle on the stand, and uncorked it once more. 'You know - rohypnol - the date rape drug.'

'What?' the man had no idea what he was talking about.

'Muslok trancing amalgam,' Wesley sniffed the contents of the bottle, again, nodded and then replaced the stopper, 'under the microscope it's virtually indistinguishable from GHB.'

The man slowly placed the receiver back in its cradle. 'OK, I won't call the police.'

'Good.'

'Until _after_ I kill you.'

'Oh.'

As the man clicked the safety off his revolver, Gunn glanced around the room - searching for some way to stop him. His eyes fell on four glass balls nestled in a bowl on a nearby podium. He grabbed then and held them up. 'Hey these worth a lot?'

The man nodded. They were cyopian conjuring spheres. Gunn failed to look impressed, 'how much - four figures each? Five?' he began to juggle two of them in one hand, 'more?' he enquired.

The man looked sick - watching the progress of the spheres as they arced through the air and then landed once more in the young man's hand. 'Stop that!' he commanded.

'Put the weapon down,' Gunn countered. The man hesitated, torn between wanting to maintain the balance of power the gun gave him, and wanting to prevent anything happening to his very pricey artefacts. Deciding it was taking too long, Gunn let one of the orbs smash on the floor. 'Kind of delicate,' he noted - and began to juggle the remaining three. 'Look we're not thieves - we're investigators,' he explained, as he kept a careful eye on the progress of the spheres. 'Now, we need to look at your Nyazian scrolls. Put the weapon down - because I'm getting kinda tired here.'

Unable to face losing yet another precious orb, the man finally did as he was told. Wesley retrieved the gun and put the safety back on. Gunn dropped another orb - and the owner gasped in horror - but it only bounced off the street fighter's shoe and he caught it once more - unharmed. He grinned, 'always like to give them a big finish.'

* * *

Fred came down the stairs into the lobby, and then drew up short - hesitating. There was no one around, except for Doyle - who was working away on his computer. He glanced up when he sensed someone in the room with him - and then smiled when he saw her. 'Hey, Fred.'

She twisted this way and that, looking for a sign of anyone else. But the place was deserted and so she realised she would have to speak to the King of the monsters, all by herself. 'Uh - hey - um… where's...Wesley...and everyone?'

'Wes and Gunn are off committing crime. They've gone to break into someone's house to retrieve a prophecy. I'm researching it for them.'

'Why isn't Wesley doing the research?...and you doing the...crime. I would have thought…'

'That we're better suited that way around?' He chuckled, and returned to his work as he spoke. 'You're not wrong, darlin'. But - uh - I got into some - um - legal trouble - a while back, it's probably best if I don't tempt fate and start stealin' stuff… again. Might find myself with a one way ticket back to Ireland - if y' know what I mean.'

'Oh - well…' she gave a nervous and uncomfortable grin, 'where's Angel then? He can't be out breaking and entering. Not with that big ol' sunshine up in the sky.'

'That he can't,' The Irishman frowned at what the information on the screen seemed to be telling him, and glanced back up at Fred instead, 'the dark avenger is down in his dank little cell,' he nodded towards the basement door, 'training up Cordelia.'

Fred glanced in the direction Doyle had pointed to - and then walked off towards the basement, to see what was going on down there. The half demon watched her go, a slight frown still playing on his face.

...

The young woman stood at the top of the basement stairs, she could hear Cordelia talking. 'Ow. That doesn't feel right,' she was saying.

'Just relax,' Angel's voice was soft and reassuring, 'You have to bend.'

'I don't bend there… OK that feels downright unnatural.'

Fred went down a couple of steps, and the sparring partners came into view. Angel was standing directly behind Cordelia, his arms wrapped around her as he helped her contort herself into their next fighting position. The scene was tender and intimate - and they looked far more like they were embracing than sparring.

...

She left them to it - smiling to herself - and returned to the lobby. Doyle looked up again as she walked back in. 'How's it goin' down there?' he asked.

'Angel's so supportive, isn't he?' Fred said, 'and so patient… but he relies on Cordelia so much, I guess.'

'I guess we all do - lucky she's got such broad shoulders… metaphorically, that is. Her actual shoulders are very slender and attractive, if I say so myself.'

'Yes, but…' she slid onto a stool at the counter, and smiled dreamily, 'he's such a champion. And that sets him apart from everyone else. He's so lucky to have Cordy, when he gets back from helping the helpless - to patch him up, to make everything right again. Everyone should get to have the kind of support they give each other - they're so well matched.'

Doyle raised an eyebrow, and smiled at her. 'I know I'm not your favourite person in all the world, darlin', but it's a wee bit rude to actually campaign for my girlfriend to leave me for my best friend right in front of me, yeah?'

Fred looked flustered - 'oh, I didn't mean…'

Doyle chuckled, 'I know. You just got carried away with the romance of two incredibly beautiful heroes falling for one another 'cause no one else can understand what it's like to be them. I can't blame y' - it's a good story. But it isn't the first time our boy has gone down this road. Cordelia can make her own decisions about what she wants out of life, but even if I wasn't _personally_ invested in her decision - I'd warn her off Angel. Every reason he had to split up with Buffy is still just as relevant when you swap her out for Cordy. As long as the girl Angel is hankerin' after is a human, then the big dumb lunk _can't_ have a future with her - and he knows that.'

Fred looked crestfallen, 'Oh - I guess - a human woman would grow old and die, and Angel would be all alone again … and just think of the children. How would that even work?'

'Vampire's can't have children - they're dead,' Doyle told her, still smiling at the way Fred was so openly pining for a Cordelia/Angel romance right in front of him.

She nodded slowly when she heard that news. 'I guess that makes sense,' she agreed, 'so they can't have any kind of future. It wouldn't be fair for him to be with her, knowing he was stopping her from ever being a mother - would it?'

Doyle stopped smiling, abruptly, and went back to his research. 'No,' he cleared his throat, awkwardly, 'no, I guess that wouldn't be fair...'


	26. Offspring: Part Two

'I know it feels strange,' Angel said, 'but if an attacker comes at you from behind, you want to be able to shift all your weight immediately to your other foot, so you can spin and kick - here try it.'

He carefully positioned Cordelia - and then grabbed hold of her from behind. She transferred the balance of her weight and pivoted around, shooting her leg out so it would hit the vampire squarely in the chest. It was very gracefully done - and would have landed a forceful blow… but Angel used his enhanced reflexes to grab her leg and stop her foot from connecting with his torso. Then he grabbed her around the waist to prevent her from falling.

He just held her like that, for a moment. She was giggling, as the rush of spinning so fast - and then nearly tumbling - made her head go all funny. And he just felt her closeness and her warmth… and longed to draw her in closer. Instead, he took a firm hold of his senses, and put her foot back on the floor and steadied her. 'We'll keep working on it,' he told her, 'but I think that's enough for today.'

'Yeah - if we keep going - I'll have to ice every bone in my body,' she told him, 'I'm out.' She limped back up the stairs, and Angel stayed down in the basement - trying to get a lid on his emotions before he went back up to the team.

* * *

Cordelia crossed through the lobby, and ducked behind the counter to where Doyle was working. She wrapped her arms around him from behind and kissed him on the temple, 'how goes the research into the end of the world?'

'2 Day passes to Disneyland are about $80.'

'I think we can afford that.'

'Well we're not goin' to need long term savin's in the event of an apocalypse. We can even go nuts and stay in a Disney hotel.'

'Now that _is_ living dangerously!' she laughed. She glanced at the other woman, who was still seated at the counter, 'Hey, Fred,'

'Hey - you guys are going to Disneyland?'

'If we can get a day off before the apocalypse starts… two days of true love and happily ever afters,' she kissed Doyle's temple again, squeezing him tighter as she spoke, 'followed up by horrifying bloodshed and death.'

'Sounds… nice,' Fred smiled weakly.

'That's what we thought,' Cordelia grinned. 'I'm just popping in the shower,' she told her boyfriend, kissing him one last time. 'I'll be back in ten - OK?'

...

The front door opened, just as Cordelia left the lobby and climbed the stairs to Doyle's room, and Wesley and Gunn returned - victorious. Wesley's face lit up when he saw Fred already in the lobby, 'Ah - Fred - excellent - I was hoping you would be able to help us with the Nyazian scrolls - there's some complicated maths involved.'

'I took a look at it on the way over here,' Gunn grinned at her, 'was gibberish to me - needs the expertise of our resident girl genius.'

Fred grinned with pleasure, and blushed bright pink, looking down at her feet in embarrassment. Doyle watched the three of them… but didn't say anything.

* * *

By the time Cordelia came back down from her shower, Angel had joined the rest of the team in the lobby. Fred was busy working away at some frightening looking equations, and Wesley was buried deep in his transcribing. The other three men were not doing very much at all. 'Well that can't be right,' Fred said, wrinkling her nose up in confusion, 'unless the world ended last March.'

'My world nearly ended last March,' Cordelia said, as she went to go and pour herself some coffee, 'but fortunately circumstances were averted.'

'Did Angel save you?'

'Not, Angel - no,' Doyle answered, instead. 'Angel wasn't very much help at all, if I remember correctly.' The vampire looked guilty, as Cordelia nodded along in agreement with her boyfriend.

'So are we talking Armageddon - or bad house number?' Gunn asked the watcher, sitting down in front of him, 'is it a bad event or a bad guy?'

'I'm not sure,' Wesley frowned. 'It isn't clear. It predicts the arrival or arising of the Tro-Clon, the person or being that brings about the ruination of mankind… except ruination might mean purification. It depends on the language you translate from. In ga-shundi it even means both.'

'And we've already been there and done that for that mistake,' Cordelia grinned.

'Yeah, bud, I think we've misread enough prophecies to last us a lifetime - we wanna get this one right,' Doyle added.

Angel still said nothing. He just sat on the round sofa, all by himself - and watched Cordelia. Eventually, she noticed his staring and went over to sit by him. 'So you going all psycho stalker on me or what?' she asked him.

'Huh?'

'The staring - it was getting creepy.'

'Oh - uh..' he wriggled uncomfortably, unsure of what to say.

She smiled at him, in sympathy and put a hand on his knee. 'Is it because you love me?' she asked.

' _What?'_ he sounded horrified.

'Because, you know I feel the same way, right? I love you, Angel.'

'What? Why? When did this happen?'

'Well - we've been friends for a long time - these sorts of feelings just develop naturally. It was bound to happen.' She squeezed his knee, and smiled her thousand kilowatt smile at him.

He was still floundering. 'What about Doyle?'

Her smile dimmed, a little, and she looked confused. 'Well, he loves you too - obviously.'

'Ummm,' it was like there was an earthquake going on under his feet. The ground was moving beneath him and he had no place of security to stand.

'And he loves Wes and Gunn and Fred. As do I. As do you.' She squeezed his knee again. 'I know it's scary - this whole end of the world thing. But this stuff needs saying. I love you Angel, you're my best friend and I wouldn't be without you.'

'Oh right - of course,' he forced a chuckle, 'friends… I knew that.'

...

'OK this makes more sense,' Fred's voice cut through their conversation. 'If these calculations are correct, then the bad thing should already be here…' everyone glanced around the lobby - and noted the lack of danger. 'Well… I guess not right _here_ ,' she amended, 'but here in L.A.'

...

'Do you really mean that - that you wouldn't be without me?' Angel asked Cordelia.

'I wouldn't have said it otherwise. We're friends - we've seen the best and the worst of each other - we _know_ each other. And for what it's worth - the good I've seen in you totally outweighs the bad.'

'You too,' he mumbled, 'thanks.' Now the sheer bewilderment of her proclamation of love had left him, he was beginning to feel the first tinges of disappointment. He wanted her to take her hand off his knee - for something - anything - to get in the way of the intimacy of this moment. It was too painful.

But she didn't get that. She couldn't. She didn't know his true feelings. So she just patted his leg and smiled at him again. 'What are friends for?' she asked.

'If you ask me, they're for knocking you up and leaving you high and dry,' a voice interrupted. The whole team looked towards the disturbance. Darla stood by the door - massively pregnant and cradling her bump. She looked straight at Angel. 'Hello lover, long time no see.'

* * *

'Darla!' Angel stared up at his sire in disbelief. The rest of the team stared at her, likewise.

'Darla?' Wesley was as incredulous as Angel was - especially when he took in the significance of her swollen belly.

'Well - when did this happen?' The vampire scrambled to his feet, looking panicked. Cordelia and Doyle glanced across at each other. Cordy quirked an eyebrow at her boyfriend - but rather than smirk back at her, Doyle dropped his eyes and stared down at his shoes. Cordelia frowned.

'You know exactly when this happened,' Darla said, coming down the stairs - stroking her bump.

'This is impossible,' Angel said.

'Tell me about it - _Daddy_.'

...

Unnoticed by the two vampires, and most of the team - Doyle turned and walked out of the lobby, heading into Wes' office. Cordelia noticed him go, though, and frowned again… but she was far too interested in the unfolding drama to bail out and go speak to him, now. Whyever he'd taken himself off - she'd catch up with him later. Right now she wanted to focus on Angel… and Darla.

...

'Vampires can't have children,' Angel said 'right, Wesley?' The watcher agreed that the situation was impossible. But that was no comfort to Darla. Angel knew this was impossible - she knew this was impossible - and yet here they were.

'I wonder if this might not be that bad thing we were expecting?' Fred mused.

Not the words a pregnant mother wants to hear. 'What have you done to me?' Darla snarled at Angel, striking him across the face with her fist. He stumbled backwards and fell against the weapons cabinet.

* * *

Inside Wes' office, Doyle heard the crash as the vampire hit the glass, and looked up from the tumbler of scotch he had poured himself. After a moment - when he heard no more sounds of violence - he shrugged and tossed the drink back.

* * *

'Hey!' Cordelia positioned herself between the two vampires, 'stop that!'

'It's OK,' Angel said to her, righting himself, 'I'm OK.'

'Not you - you had that coming, buster… Darla - you shouldn't get yourself upset in your condition, here…' she led the female vampire over to the round sofa, 'sit down. You shouldn't be on your feet. Do you want some water?'

Fred fetched the drink, and held it out. 'Hi! I'm Fred. Is water OK or would you like some blood?' Darla took the glass, and Wesley crossed the room to gently pull Fred away from the pregnant vampire. Cordelia stayed sat beside her. She looked at Angel - a challenge in her eyes. 'So what do you have to say for yourself?'

'Um…' he had nothing.

'OK… how are you going to make this better? What are you going to do?'

'What am I going to do? What _can_ I do?'

'Oh - I think he's already done enough,' Darla said.

Cordelia turned back to her, 'have you been to see a doctor?'

The vampire gave her a disbelieving look - of course she hadn't visited a doctor. She had, however, visited every shaman and seer in the western hemisphere.

'And what did they say?' Wesley asked - sounding fascinated… and horrified.

'They don't what it is. They don't know what it means. Nothing like this has ever happened.'

'Maybe it's a hysterical pregnancy,' Angel suggested. Cordelia gave him a dark look.

'Wanna feel it kick?' Darla asked. It kicked like crazy. The father reckoned that kicking would be the first sign of … hysteria. This time, everyone gave him a dark look.

'You need to take responsibility,' Cordy told him.

'Me? ...right … um, Wes - let's get on this straight away.'

'What do you suggest we do?'

'Get your books - look stuff up - jeez do I have to think of everything around here?' He was sounding irate, but no one was on his side.

The watcher picked up the nearest book and flicked it open. 'Oh yes, here it is,' he said. Darla leaned forward on the sofa, Angel hurried over to get a closer look at the page. But it was in vain. 'I have absolutely no idea what is going on,' Wesley pretended to read - and snapped the book shut. 'Maybe we should go speak to the Host?'

* * *

'Doyle?' Cordelia pushed the office door open and stepped inside, 'what's…' she came to a halt and stopped talking, as her eyes fell on the bottle of scotch and the glass.

The Irishman looked up at her, and then followed her gaze - looking at the bottle, himself. 'Don't… Cordy, just... don't,' he said to her.

'Don't mention your taking yourself off to have a solo liquor binge… in the middle of a crisis - um, let me think about that - _no_.'

'Just not now - OK. We'll talk later. You can bust my chops later. Just leave it for now… please?' He looked back up at her, meeting her eyes with his own. They were swimming in pain, bleeding hurt - so much so that she took a step back, and bit her lip.

She nodded. 'Whatever this is… you tell me later, OK?' she said, 'I wanna make this better… I'm going to make this better… but, we're headed off to Caritas - hoping that the Host can lay some clarity on Angel's baby drama.'

Doyle closed his eyes and inhaled.

'...anyway,' his girlfriend continued, looking even more disconcerted, 'you should probably come. This is… this is big. Fred thinks this could be the bad thing she sees in the math. You're Angel's seer - his link to The Powers. If his kid is gonna … I don't know… end mankind, or whatever - he's gonna need you.'

'Right - Angel's gonna need me. So I'll be there for him,' he slung back the last of his scotch and heaved himself out of the chair - slamming the tumbler down on the desk, 'because _I'm_ always there when _he_ needs _me_.'

He was surprised when, as he reached the door, Cordelia wrapped her arms around him. 'You're always there when I need you, too,' she murmured, and kissed him, 'because you are a wonderful human being.'

' _Half_ human being,' he muttered.

'Whatever,' she kissed him again, and then pulled back so she could look into his eyes. 'I love you.'

'I thought you were mad at me for drinkin'?'

'I am … but I still love you.'

She kept her arm wrapped around him, as they walked back into the lobby - where Angel was still panicking.

* * *

'Oh no - this is all kinds of wrong.' Lorne stared at the painting the two people were holding up. It was hideous - he didn't want that … _thing_ on the wall of his baby. 'Try it on the back wall…' he suggested, 'far away from where people might be eating.' The artwork was carried away to be hidden, and the green skinned demon turned to where the transuding furies were chanting.

' _Violence abounds, violence restrain. This place a sanctuary was and shall be again.'_

'That's great girls,' he smiled - and then he frowned as he looked at the bill his contractor had just handed him. 'Arnie - why are you charging me twelve hundred over the estimate here?'

The contractor straightened up and turned to face him. 'Had to run a separate two twelve to the security box. Double insulation everywhere in the building. Plus, we had a run on Kek bile and bin-der glands. And you know what you said:' Arnie's eyes suddenly went blank and began to glow - when he spoke it was a recording of Lorne's own voice, _'This club's my baby. I want top drawer throughout.'_

But the Host was cut off from arguing back, by Angel's voice floating through the doorway, 'Lorne - you here? You gotta help me. We got,' he glanced back at all the others coming down the stairs, 'kind of a situation here.'

' _Mmm Angel,'_ the transuding furies, becoming aware of the vampire's presence, sighed in ecstasy at the sight of him. Doyle stared at them - not that they condescended to notice him.

'They're always like this,' Cordelia whispered to her boyfriend, 'it's beyond gross.' She raised her voice, 'you girls are on the pill, I hope,' she said to the furies.

' _Mmm,'_ moaned the furies, once more.

'Yuck,' Cordelia shook her head, and watched Angel drag Lorne away from the group a little, and demand to know what the three sisters were doing there. The Host explained they were recasting the sanctuary spell that Cordelia had asked them to break the night of the massacre - only this time it would cover humans as well as demons. Lorne wasn't making the same mistake twice!

'I'm opening up the club again,' he told the vampire, 'I know I was pretty blue for a while there - if it had gone on any longer, I'd have turned aquamarine!' he was the only one who laughed. 'So what happened here?' he asked, looking at Darla.

'What does it look like?' Darla asked him.

'Angel boned her,' Cordy explained.

'Yep, it turns out Angel - _the vampire_ \- can get girls pregnant… which is just - _great_.' The Irishman's voice was bitter, and Cordy cast him yet another worried glance. 'Oh,' she breathed, understanding what his problem was, at last.

Angel turned to look at her - wondering what was going on, but was interrupted by Fred before he could say anything. 'Is Angel gonna sing?' the woman asked.

'Oh, man,' Gunn groaned. But Wesley agreed that there didn't seem to be any other way.

Cordelia shook her head, though, 'she's the one carrying the baby,' she said - pointing at Darla.

Darla leaned forward and grabbed the Host by the lapels, ' _Oh Danny Boy,'_ she grunted, rather than sang, but the Host cut her off. They were way past singing! He turned to all the people working to put the club back together and told them to go home for the evening. Then he focused back on Darla and began to scrutinise her. But he wasn't sure what he could do; this was way beyond his ken… and his barbie … and all his action figures. 'If it's alive…' he started to say.

'Oh it's alive,' the pregnant vampire assured him, 'and kicking.'

'It could be anything…' Lorne shook his head, 'a child born of two vampires…'

'Maybe it's some kind of uber vamp?' Gunn suggested.

'What? You mean like vampire concentrate?' Doyle asked, the thought seemed to perk him up a little. Cordelia frowned again. Wesley told the Host about the Nyazian prophecies and their mentioning of the Tro-Clon, which was supposed to be in Los Angeles right around now.

'Born out of darkness to bring darkness,' Lorne nodded.

'Great,' Angel sounded aggrieved, 'so we're saying my kid is the scourge of mankind?'

'Makes sense when y' think about it,' Doyle told him, 'you were the scourge of Europe… what else could it be?'

Angel looked even more annoyed. Darla began to groan. 'OK, we're upsetting the pregnant lady,' Cordelia cut in, 'maybe she should lie down?'

'She can have my room,' the Host ushered Cordelia and Darla through the club to the back. After a moment, Doyle followed along behind them. Lorne opened the door that led to his bedroom and showed them inside. Darla was groaning the whole way.

'Maybe we should call a doctor?' Cordelia wondered, but the vampire dropped down on the bed and told her the pain would pass - it always did. The other woman nodded, and turned to the green demon whose place they were crashing, 'I'll stay with her.' The Host nodded and left, telling the women he'd be right outside.

Cordelia then fixed her gaze on her boyfriend, who was lurking uncomfortably in the corner, 'are you going back to Angel?' she asked him. But he shook his head, he didn't want to be around Angel right now - and he didn't like the idea of leaving Cordelia alone with a vampire, even one groaning in pain.


	27. Offspring: Part Three

When Lorne got back to the others, Angel was pacing up and down - angry. He didn't accept the prophecy the way Wesley was reading it. There was always a thousand different interpretations - and they'd been wrong before. He turned on Fred, 'how do we even know if your calculations are correct?'

'We don't, I'm still working on them.'

'Well - we do know Darla's pregnant with something,' Gunn pointed out. But Angel replied that this was biologically impossible. He was dead… he couldn't father children, and Darla, well… how could a dead body be a life giving one? How could her demon driven, hollowed out husk nourish a life inside it - when no lifesblood coursed through her veins? Life could not be brought forth from death … it just couldn't.

Wesley began to muse. Maybe all the prophecies were interconnected. Maybe the Shanshu prophecy wasn't about Angel, after all. Perhaps it was his child that was the pivotal figure in the coming darkness. Maybe Angel's role was simply to bring them into the world. Angel thought for a moment, 'or to stop it,' he said.

'Can I say something about destiny?' Fred asked, getting to her feet. The men all looked at her. 'Screw destiny,' she told them, 'if this evil thing comes then we'll fight it, and we'll keep fighting it 'til we whoop it. Because destiny is just another word for inevitable, and nothing is inevitable as long as you stand up, look it in the face and say 'you're evitable'... well, you catch my drift.'

'Wow I like her so much,' Lorne said, looking impressed.

But her pep talk had galvanised Angel. He nodded along. 'Right, I want to see these prophecies myself - and your calculations, Fred, and anything else we got.'

Fred offered to go back to the hotel and get her working. 'Good idea,' agreed Wesley, 'We put our heads together and figure out a way to fight this thing.'

Fred left the bar, and Angel pulled Lorne to one said. 'Is she mad at me?' he asked, 'she's mad isn't she?'

'Well, you aren't her favourite person in the world right now, that's for sure,' the Host told him, 'but she's scared as well as angry. Exhausted, poor thing looks eighteen month pregnant, not eight.'

Angel blinked, and then shook his head, 'not Darla!' he corrected, 'Cordelia!'

'Oh…' Lorne frowned, 'Cordy's not mad, no. Worried, I guess, about a whole host of things - but she's not angry. The little guy's aura is lit up like a Christmas tree, though.'

'Doyle? Is mad?' Angel looked nonplussed, 'what about?'

But Lorne just smiled, 'he didn't sing for me, Cara-mia … I'm just picking up the highlights.'

'Huh.'

* * *

Cordelia sat beside Darla on the bed, and dabbed at her forehead with a wet cloth. Doyle leaned against the wall, his arms folded across his chest, his expression dark and glowery. 'How are you feeling?' Cordy asked the vampire.

'Just... crazy.'

'What?'

Darla sighed. 'Why would anyone bring something into this world?'

Doyle pushed himself off the wall, and unfolded his arms, 'what do you mean?' he asked.

'Look at this place,' Darla said to him, 'the whole show - good, evil - love, hate - death. What is there in this world that makes any sense? Has any purpose? We're all just… trying to get by, without dying - but it comes for us all in the end. Why bring something else into this mess? Why even bother?'

The young couple glanced at each other. 'Well - there's lots of reasons to…' Cordelia began to say.

But Darla cut her off. 'I'm 400 years old,' the vampire told her. 'I've seen everything - done everything. I've died three times - twice as a human and once as a vampire… and it still isn't enough. I keep getting sucked back in. There's nothing… just nothing.'

The couple exchanged another glance, unsure of what to say in response to the vampire's gloomy outburst. Not least, since her words made more than a little sense. She was 400 years old - she ought to know what she was talking about. 'Doyle - maybe you should get Darla some water?' Cordelia said, hoping that refreshing Darla might at least make her feel a bit happier. Plus - this seemed like a time for girl talk if ever the young woman had seen it. Not shoes and nail polish - real stuff, _women stuff_ \- the bits they didn't talk about in front of the men.

The half demon nodded and headed into the adjoining bathroom, where he began to run the faucet to get the water cold.

'It's hard when you're pregnant,' Cordelia said to the vampire, 'I was pregnant once, I was…' she laughed and held out a hand, 'out here - overnight.' She raised her voice, 'do you remember that, Doyle?' He shouted back in the affirmative.

'Not his - I hasten to add,' Cordelia continued. 'Mystical thing - it didn't get to term. So I get it, I do. Everything aches, your back and legs hurt just … all the time. One minute you're sick to your stomach and can't eat a thing, and the next you're ravenous. Are you able to eat or do you just…' she cut herself off.

But it was too late. Darla levered herself up on the bed, a hungry look on her face. 'Drink?' she suggested.

Cordelia got to her feet and began to back away. 'Well, it's not really any of my business is it…' she glanced towards the bathroom, the water was still running - what was he doing in there - how long did it take to get a glass of water?

Darla was on her feet now, Cordelia tried to open the bedroom door - but the vampire was suddenly right by her - and held it closed. She then kept her arm on the door, so that Cordelia was pinned against it. She wore her demon face. 'I'm hungry all the time, now,' the vampire said, 'it's weird.'

Cordy nodded her head, 'well you're eating for two now - it's only natural.' Her voice was high pitched and nervous. She looked back towards the bathroom door, and opened her mouth to yell for Doyle.

But Darla saw her intake of breath, and clamped a hand over her mouth. 'No,' she disagreed, 'what's weird is … no matter how much I feed, I can't ever seem to get full.'

Cordelia yanked her head away, to free herself from the vampire's grip. Then she swung her fist straight into Darla's face. The vampire stumbled, as the unexpected blow hit her, and Cordy followed it up with another punch, and then pulled out a cross and brandished it in the other woman's face. 'Pregnant or not - you're _going_ to keep your distance.'

From the bathroom - she heard the sound of the faucet shutting off - _finally!_ But it was already too late. Darla simply batted the cross aside and then lunged at Cordelia, sinking her fangs into the young woman's throat.

...

Doyle appeared in the bathroom doorway, carrying a glass of water, 'here y' g…' The glass dropped to the floor and shattered, the water spilling everywhere, as he took in the scene in front of him. Darla had Cordelia pinned against the door and was biting down on her, tearing into her neck. An instant later, the half demon had morphed into his spikes and was at his girlfriend's side, using his extra strength to try and pull the vampire off her. But as he lay hands on Darla, BAM! He was hit by a sudden vision and reeled back in pain. The images swarmed into his mind, and the pain was blinding, like the top of his skull was being sliced open - but for once he did not drop to the floor and give into the onslaught.

In shrieking agony, blinded and deafened from pain, as he was, he still stumbled forward and grabbed hold of Darla once again. He wasn't going to let her hurt Cordy. He wasn't going to let Cordelia die just because The Powers That Be had rotten timing. Though he could barely stand upright, he clung onto Darla and hauled back on her. But he wasn't having much success ... and he was fading … the longer he held onto the pregnant vampire, the more intense his vision became … he couldn't hold on much longer.

And then - suddenly - Angel was there. 'Get away from her!' he yanked Darla off the woman; and the vampire, and the half demon holding onto her, tumbled to the floor. Ignoring them both, Angel swept Cordelia into his arms and carried her to the bed, where he lay her down upon it, gently. 'You're gonna be alright, you're gonna be alright.'

Cordelia kept her hand clamped to her gaping wound, she could feel the blood spilling out between her fingers. 'Ouch.'

Down on the floor, now he was no longer connected to the pregnant vampire, Doyle felt the vision pain recede, and he scrambled to his feet and climbed onto the bed beside Cordy. 'Let me see,' he said, trying to look at her bite mark. 'Are you OK?'

Angel came out of the bathroom with a cloth, and pressed it against her neck. She took it from him and held it there, smiling gratefully. 'Here, let me...' Doyle reached out to hold the cloth for her, but she twisted away, 'it's OK - I got it.' He let his arm drop.

'I'm going to kill her for this,' Angel pronounced…

Nut Cordelia just looked down at the floor, devoid of any vampires, 'you're gonna have to find her, first.'

* * *

The bedroom door opened, and Angel strode out, carrying Cordelia in his arms. Doyle followed along after, 'I've got her,' he was saying, 'leave it, man … I can take care of her.' They all came to a halt when they saw the bar - its furniture overturned, and the others picking themselves up off the floor.

'She bit Cordy,' Angel told them. 'Where is she?'

'She got away,' Wesley told him, rubbing his face with his hands and wincing in pain.

'We tried to stop her, by hitting her fists and feet with our faces, but…' Gunn added.

Angel looked around the room, 'right, we take Cordelia someplace safe, and then I go and find her.'

He began to walk towards the exit, Doyle again dogged his heels, 'I can take care of her, man - put her down...'

...

But Angel had continued to ignore Doyle; and had carried her out to the car, and then, when they reached the hotel - had picked her back up and carried her upstairs. He paid lip service to Doyle's complaints by putting her on Doyle's bed and not his own… but only because Doyle's was closer. Once they were all in the room, the half demon had all but shoved the vampire out of the way, and had used Cordelia's first aid kit to patch her up.

'You need to clean the wound first,' Angel said, from over his shoulder.

'Back off man, I'm doin' it.' He used an antiseptic wipe to clean the area, Cordelia gasped as it stung.

'You're hurting her, let me…'

But Doyle shrugged him off, 'the wipes sting… you'd hurt her just as much.' Then he selected a bandage and cut some tape.

'You're taking too long,' the vampire complained.

'I'm doin' it right - not quick!' Doyle retorted, 'Cordelia needs patching up properly, not some half assed slap on job.' He gently applied the gauze to her neck and pressed down the tape so it stuck in place.

'Guys…' Cordelia tried to interrupt, but Doyle shushed her, and then turned back to Angel, 'are you gonna just stand there, or are you gonna fetch her some water so she can take the aspirin?'

The vampire disappeared for a moment and then returned carrying a glass of water, Doyle snatched it from his hand, gave Cordy the pills to swallow and then handed her the drink. When she was done, he took it from her and set it down on the side. She lay back against the pillows and closed her eyes. Her boyfriend leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. He could feel Angel's eyes on him, the whole time, as he did so. 'Don't you have a vampire to be slayin'?' he asked, without turning to look at Angel, 'you don't have to stay here, I can take care of Cordelia.'

'Cordelia?' Angel kept his voice low and gentle, seeking the woman's assurance that it was alright for him to go, ignoring her boyfriend once again.

'I'm fine … you don't have to stay.'

'Gunn will be right outside,' he nodded to where the street fighter stood in the hallway, holding a crossbow.

opened her eyes and smiled out at Gunn, 'thanks.'

But Doyle was even more annoyed than ever, 'what, you think I can't protect her?'

'I think Cordy is too important to take any chances… no matter whose ego that steps on.'

'Guys…' Cordelia tried to interrupt again. But once again, she had no luck.

'Yeah, right, Cordy's "important" to you… sure she is, if that's what we're callin' it.'

'What is your problem?' demanded Angel squaring up the smaller man, and glowering down at him.

But Doyle wasn't going to be intimidated by the vampire's extra inches - and he squared up right back at him, his face just as dark. 'My _problem_ is that you're pregnant girlfriend just tried to kill _my_ girlfriend. And instead of goin' out there and findin' her… you're in here… where you're not needed. Sniffin' around.'

'Not needed? Cordelia would've died if I hadn't…'

'She would never've been in danger if you hadn't boned Darla and knocked her up… so don't try and act like the hero in this scenario, pal.'

'Guys…' a final attempt from the bed.

'You know what, back off Doyle! You couldn't protect Cordy from Darla - you left her alone with her and then you weren't strong enough to save her. So, yeah - I think I can act like the hero in this scenario, _pal_. 'Cause it sure as hell aint you.'

Doyle launched himself at the vampire, leading with a headbutt. Angel staggered backwards, and then swung back at the half demon.

'Fellas, fellas,' Gunn stepped in the middle of them, holding Doyle back and blocking the larger man from reaching him. 'What is this? Now I get emotions are running high, the world is endin', Darla's carrying Angel's kid and Cordy got bit… but now is not the time to fall apart. We need to work the case. Angel - you go find Darla. Doyle - you take care of Cordy - and I don't want another outbreak of violence in this room or else I will _personally_ put your ass down with my crossbow, understood?'

Angel raised his hands, and backed off, 'I'm gone,' he looked at Gunn, 'protect Cordelia for me.'

That goaded Doyle into launching himself forward again, but Gunn held him back. 'Get outta here, man,' the street fighter said to the vampire. 'Doyle, _calm down_.'

'I know where she's headed,' Doyle said, sulkily. The vampire turned back towards him. 'I saw it in my vision.'

* * *

Angel scanned the weapons cabinet, selecting everything he wanted - he was preparing for war. Wesley watched him. 'I'm not saying this to you as the boss,' he said, 'because I know you wouldn't listen, but you shouldn't do this alone.'

'I _have_ to do this alone.'

But the watcher tried to talk him out of that mindset. A normal vampire was strong, and Darla wasn't normal before this. She took down three full grown men without breaking stride. She was stronger than all of them combined, right now - because of what was inside of her.

'I know - I put it there,' Angel said, finishing with the weapon's cabinet and closing it up. He walked out of the building. Wesley watched him go. 'Why does he think he has to do everything alone?' he asked Fred.

She looked up from her work, and followed Wesley's gaze, so that she too was looking at the doorway that Angel had just left through. 'Maybe he can't bear for us to see him do it?' She suggested.

'Kill Darla? She tried to kill Cordy - and she is a vampire.'

'Who is carrying his child,' Fred said, gently, 'the one thing he can never have - even if he lives forever.'


	28. Offspring: Part Four

'OK, buster, what gives?' Cordelia's voice was thick with the effects of the blood loss and the pills, but once Doyle had shut the door on Gunn - she reached her hand out to him and pulled him over to her. He climbed onto the bed, beside her, and lay down with her - stroking her hair. Her eyes were closed, and she smiled, 'that's nice… but what's going on?'

'It's nothin'.' He dropped her kiss on her forehead, 'go to sleep, heal, yeah?'

'Nuh-uh, not 'til you tell me what's bugging you. You're acting all out of character. What were you thinking - going for Angel like that? he'd flatten you in a millisecond.'

The hair stroking stopped, and she felt him go stiff, 'you think so, huh?'

She opened her eyes. 'I _know_ so,' her voice was croaky, 'and so do you and so does he. He's a _vampire_ , Doyle. You don't have vampire strength - even when you're spiky. He's way stronger than you - and a better fighter - and normally that isn't a problem, for any of us. So why are you so wound up about it today?'

She heard him inhale, sharply, and then…'I just… I didn't like the way he took over y'know. Insisting on carryin' you to the car, and into the hotel. He wasn't letting me look after y' - he was musclin' in.'

'What does that matter?' She sounded confused, as well as sleepy, now, 'surely all that matters is I'm OK?'

'Yeah - I guess that's what matters.'

Her eyes snapped open again, 'way to sound convinced! You'd rather I got snacked on by Darla, than rescued by Angel?'

The Irishman wriggled uncomfortably. 'I'm being a jackass,' he told her.

'You are,' she agreed, 'why?'

'OK - hear me out, yeah?'

'Mhmm.'

He scooched around, so he was propped up on his elbow, looking down at Cordelia. 'You know how you said you take care o' me and I take care o' you and that's because we belong together?'

She nodded at his words, and he continued. 'And you said no one was keepin' a runnin' score on who got rescued the most often, 'cause it didn't matter - we all help each other out?'

She nodded again. 'Well - the other week - with Billy, you _promised_ me that sometime soon you would get into danger and I would be the one that got to save y'. 'Cause you're forever havin' to save me. And then … Darla bites y' - and I can't pull her off 'cause I'm havin' a vision… and who swoops in to do the rescuin' but Captain Forehead. And, fair enough, he saved your life - and I'm grateful - but then he wouldn't let me back in. Takin' care o' y' is meant to be my job - and he took it. Like he didn't think I could do it properly.'

'You really are a jackass,' Cordelia pulled him down to her, and planted a kiss on his prominent nose. 'I don't want Angel here taking care of me - I want you.'

'But he can do a better job than me.'

'No. He can't. He can fight better than you. He can kill better than you… I don't want that. He doesn't do anything else better… you even give him a run for his money on brooding!'

There was silence between them for a few moments, Doyle watched Cordelia's chest rise and fall with deep, even breaths - and thought she had finally fallen asleep. He lay down next to her, again, and wrapped his arms around her and closed his own eyes - and that was when she spoke again. 'How much of this ridiculousness is down to Darla turning up - pregnant?'

'Vampires can't get pregnant,' Doyle said - not really wanting to answer.

'No they can't - and yet here she is - and Angel is the father. Is that what this is about?'

'He shouldn't - he shouldn't be able to.' There was another long pause, and then, 'it isn't fair,' Doyle said quietly.

'No.'

'Angel's killed so many people, he abandoned us to hunt down Darla… he used her in his own moment of despair - and he gets rewarded for that. He gets to be a dad.'

'Of the scourge of mankind!' Cordelia reminded him. 'This isn't a normal pregnancy. Whatever Darla has inside of her - I don't think you need to be jealous of Angel just yet. Besides…' she kissed him on the nose, again, 'if two infertile vampires can get mystically pregnant - what's to say there isn't a miracle pregnancy down the line for us?'

'I don't think we're important enough in the grand scheme o' things, to break the rules of the universe like that.'

'And yet - you're the one that a higher power saw fit to change the course of destiny for. Not Angel.'

'Ah - I'm a nobody, it was probably all for somebody else's good… probably Angel's.'

'Defeatist,' Cordelia muttered. 'OK - so we shouldn't assume that just because Angel can father children means you'll be given the same chance to… but at least that means you don't have to worry about unleashing a monster on the world. I dread to think what Darla's carrying right now… what might happen if she comes to term.'

Doyle kissed her on the temple, 'just go to sleep,' he murmured to her 'we can worry about it later.'… And she allowed the pills to take effect and drifted off. Her boyfriend lay beside her, holding her, and thinking about the other information he had seen in his vision...

* * *

The arcade was loud and bright. The lights glared overhead, the neon lights on the games blinked; and the beeping, buzzing and squealing of the machines closed around the little boy in a cacophony of noise. He didn't know where his mom was, he'd let go of her hand, and now he was lost. He was too small to see over the crowds and the games. And though he called for her, he knew she couldn't hear him. 'Mommy? Mommy?'

He turned around, there was a pretty lady stood right by him. She bent down to talk to him, a kind smile on her face. 'Have you lost your mommy?' she asked him. He nodded. She held a hand out, 'well why don't we look for her together?' He took her hand and they began to walk through the arcade.

'You're a brave woman,' a voice said. The pretty lady stopped and turned around, the little boy turned with her. 'About to have one - and taking another out to play.'

Darla smiled at the woman who had spoken to her, stroked her bump and gave a little laugh. 'Oh - I love children, I could just - eat them up.' The woman smiled back at her, and walked away. And Darla led her victim away into the quiet.

* * *

Doyle lay next to Cordelia and watched her sleep. He hadn't been honest with her - and that was wrong of him. She still thought Angel's kid was a monster - the scourge of mankind - some evil that had to be fought. But whilst the half demon had been clinging onto the pregnant vampire - he had been connected to her mystically, as well - The Powers had opened his mind up to show him the truth. It was important enough that they had sent the vision whilst Cordelia was in trouble - when they must know that if anything ever happened to Cordy, they would lose him as their messenger. That he would not continue to fight the good fight if he lost her to it. He knew about Darla and Angel's child - probably more than they did. And as much as he didn't want to admit the truth, as much as he was too jealous to want to face up to this, he knew he had to do the right thing.

Cordelia awoke with a gasp, and then saw him there - watching her. 'What is it?' she asked him. He stroked her hair, again, and kissed her. 'I need to talk to Wesley,' he told her, 'about the baby.'

'What is it?'

'I want to check something about this Tro-Clon thing, about whether it's gonna be born - or if it's gonna appear.'

'Why does that matter?' Cordelia's eyes were clouded with confusion - as well as sleep.

Doyle took a deep breath, 'I know why Darla is cravin' younger victims,' he told her.

* * *

'Ma'am I don't think my mom is back here,' the pretty lady had taken him to the darkest, quietest corner of the arcade. No one was there - this was a silly place to look for his mom, and he'd be in trouble, now for wandering off with a stranger.

'Are you sure?' Darla asked him, 'did you look?'

The little boy sighed, and scanned around the deserted area, calling for his mom - there was no answer. He turned back to the pretty lady… but she wasn't pretty anymore. He stared at her vampiric features and screamed.

Angel heard the scream and flew over the machines, landing in the darkened area, and tackled Darla away from the boy. He pushed her up against the wall and drove a stake towards her heart. She put her hand up in defence, and the wood drove through her palm instead of her chest.

The little boy screamed again, and ran out towards the bright lights. His mom was standing in the middle of the arcade, looking for him. She swept him up into her arms, 'there you are! How many times have I told you not to wander off?'

Darla pushed Angel away from herself - and her increased strength caused him to fly backwards, out into the brightly lit part of the arcade. He landed on a skeeball game and groaned. The pregnant vampire advanced on him, and all the humans screamed and ran out of the arcade when they saw her demonic face - and the wild look in her eyes. She pulled the stake out of her palm and let it drop to the floor. 'You so want to be the good guy - don't you?' she demanded, 'yeah - you're the good guy - the one who did this to me!'

Angel scrambled to his feet, but she just hauled back and punched him, sending him slamming against another bank of arcade games. Wesley was right - she was far stronger than he was right now. He morphed into his own vampire face. That made her laugh - a bitter, mirthless laugh. 'You may have the face. But you don't know the hunger,' she cried at him. 'It pounds! You can't make it go away! You can't stop it!'

'I'll stop it.' He hauled back and smacked her, and this time it was Darla's turn to go flying through the air. She got back to her feet and launched herself at him. He used the momentum of her dive to throw her off himself and fling her across the room once more. But she was relentless and came back for more.

Throwing furious punches at him, she pounded him until he was backed up against the corner, and then headbutted him. He braced himself against the wall and kicked her away from himself and then, before she could right herself, he threw himself at her and grabbed her by the throat - pinning her to the wall.

She began to laugh. 'I don't breathe!' she told him, 'They breathe! They breathe and pound. I don't breathe you idiot! You can't strangle me.' Her face was twisted so she looked mad, as she said it, like all reason had left her behind.

'I'm not gonna strangle you,' he pulled a stake out and raised his arm. Then he hesitated.

'Do it,' she said, 'just do it.'

But the strike never came.

Slowly, he lowered his stake, and stared down at Darla's swollen belly. He could feel… he could hear… a heartbeat, coming from inside of her. Tiny - but strong. Darla lunged forward and grabbed hold of his jacket, shaking him. 'Do it!' she cried, 'make it stop.'

But instead of killing her, he gently broke her grip on his coat, and restrained her from hitting him, holding her close to his chest. 'Darla, Darla listen to me.'

'Make it stop, make it stop.'

'The child. The child has a heartbeat - it has a soul.'

The pregnant vampire tried to break loose from him, began to struggle, 'no - not my child - not my child!'

'Our child,' he told her, 'our child. That's why you've been craving purer and purer blood. That's why you've been driven out of your mind … it has a soul.'

She collapsed against his chest and began to sob, 'no it doesn't,' she protested.

'It does.'

'It can't.'

' _It does.'_

* * *

He had taken her back to the Hyperion, and put her in his own room. He handed her a cup of pig's blood, 'here, drink this.' She took a gulp and the pulled a face. He told her she would get used to it - but she had to drink - had to keep herself nourished. She threw the mug at him, and it smashed against the wall, blood spattered the paintwork and dribbled down. Angel sighed. 'You're not alone in this anymore,' he told her, 'we'll deal with this together.'

'Gosh - I'm the luckiest vampire girl in the world.' Her voice was bitter.

He sighed again, and stood up, 'get some sleep.'

'How's Cordy?' Darla asked, 'she wanna come up and visit?' She laughed, but Angel ignored her. Instead, he stopped to speak to Gunn, who was now outside this bedroom door wielding his crossbow. 'If she goes anywhere near Cordy - or Fred...'

'I know.'

* * *

Downstairs, Wes and Fred were working away. Cordelia and Doyle were also looking through some books, they looked up as Angel joined them. 'No one goes near Darla - understood, Cordy, Fred?' he said to them. The women nodded. 'Not under any circumstances,' he clarified and then he went to the round sofa, and sank down onto it.

'So, you're gonna be a father,' Cordelia said to him.

He looked at her, 'looks like.'

'Doyle told us…' Cordelia said, glancing between the two demons in her life, 'in his vision - he felt it, the heartbeat. Your baby is human.'

'You felt that?' Angel looked at Doyle, 'you already knew when I went out to find her?'

The half demon looked awkward, 'I guess…'

'You sent me out to kill her, _knowing_ my child was human?'

'Guys - guys,' Cordelia looked alarmed. 'Let's not do this again, OK - what's wrong with you two? Things were crazed. I was injured, I was Doyle's priority… it wasn't until he had time for a breather that he realised…'

'That my kid has a soul.'

'It makes sense,' Wesley said to them all, 'Angel has a soul - as much as any of this can make sense… it isn't that surprising.'

Angel looked down at his hands. But the watcher wasn't finished. 'Still - soul or not - that doesn't mean that the child isn't what is spoken of in the prophecies.'

'The thing that's coming to kill and burn us all?' Angel asked, 'I know that - but I also know - the child is mine.'

Doyle looked down, and bit his lip. Cordelia looked between the two of them, again, her brow creased with worry. Whatever this child spelled for the rest of the world - it already seemed to spell disaster for Doyle and Angel's friendship.

Angel had been given the impossible - something neither he nor Doyle should ever be able to have… and Doyle's bitterness and jealousy over that was driving a wedge between them. Angel didn't even understand what that bitterness was - but the pair of them would lash out at each other, until neither one could remember who had started it… and their bond would be broken - maybe forever. If nothing else - this child was going to sever a champion from his connection to The Powers - and that could only be a bad…

'Uh oh,' Fred's voice cut through Cordy's ruminations.

'What is it?' she asked. The men looked up at the physicist, as well.

'Well, y'know when I said I might be off in my calculations? And Wesley said the wording of the Tro-clon could mean to arise or to be born? And we know the Latin for arrive is _arripare_ \- to come to land or possibly, in this instance, to simply awaken from a deep sleep…'

'Fred!' both Angel and Wesley tried to get her to come to the point.

'Right - I believe that whatever that thing is, it's arriving right about,' she glanced down at her watch, 'three, two, _now_ …'

* * *

Deep beneath the ground, a demon chanted in front of a large stone statue - preparing the ritual for the awakening. 'The weight of time is heavy upon the world,' the demon intoned, 'and all men born must die. But there are worlds unknown, where dreamers dream and sleepers sleep, and patiently await. As pledged in Caladan by Cod-she …' he threw some powder on the statue, 'one shall awaken in the first year of the final century. That one who lived before and joined Cod-she in the great sleep. Arise - as was promised and foretold. Arise. Arise.'

Nothing happened - and the demon lit a cigarette. He checked his watch, and took another drag. And then - suddenly - the chamber itself began to shake. Blue lightning flashed from all sides and the eyes of the statue opened - revealing a pair of human eyes beneath. Then the statue cracked, and began to fall apart, crumbling to the floor in a cloud of dust.

The demon stubbed out his cigarette, and walked over to the figure that huddled amongst the remains of the statue. He put a hand on his back. 'Welcome to the twenty first century. Angelus is here. You'll see him soon. You haven't used your muscles in a very long time - it will be a while before you are ready to…'

But the figure straightened up, immediately, and the fire of vengeance glowed in his eyes. 'Just tell me where he is,' said Daniel Holtz.


	29. Quickening: Part One

_Holtz rode hell for leather through the night until he approached the rendezvous. One of his followers - a fellow vampire hunter in his employ - waited for him there. 'We've found them,' he said. They turned their horses, and rode off together - closing in on their prey._

_..._

_Sarah opened the door - even though it was late out. A handsome man smiled down at her, and a very pretty lady stood beside him. 'Ah - is your mother home, now, young lady?' Angelus asked, 'will you take us to her?' But the little girl shook her head, she had been trained well. Father always told her not to let strangers into the house - especially at night._

_'But we're not strangers,' the man replied, 'you're Sarah, aren't you?' Sarah nodded, and the man smiled, 'we know all about you, you're the apple of your father's eye.'_

_'Would a stranger know that?' the pretty lady asked._

_Sarah shook her head, and when the man asked if they could come in, again, she stood to the side to let them pass. 'Is that a yes, then?' the man asked._

_'Yes.'_

_The two vampires swept inside, and Angelus locked the door - as Darla led the little girl into the front parlour, promising her a special treat._

_..._

_Holtz and his man arrived at the building. It was already surrounded by his other followers, brandishing torches. 'They're trapped inside,' one of them told him._

_..._

_The vampires entered the parlour and found Caroline sitting by the hearth, sewing. A baby lay in a cradle beside her, and she rocked it with her foot. 'What's all the fuss, love?' she said to Sarah, and then she saw the visitors - and nodded her welcome._

_..._

_Holtz grabbed a torch and strode towards the dark little house, 'burn it down if you have to,' he commanded._

_..._

_'We can only stay for a moment,' Angelus said, 'we have a message for your husband.'_

_'You know my Daniel?'_

_..._

_There was no sign of life in the house - the vampires must not realise they were caught - trapped. He had them at last. He marched ever closer._

_..._

_'What is the message?' Caroline smiled._

_'Why don't I give it to Sarah?' Darla asked, stroking the little girl's hair. She bent down, as if to whisper into her ear, 'close your eyes.' She brushed a lock of hair from the girl's ear, and then vamped out. With her eyes closed, the little girl knew no danger. But Caroline saw - and jumped to her feet to rescue her daughter. But Angelus pushed the woman back into her chair and held her there - and Darla bit into the throat of the child, as the mother sobbed. 'Tell your husband, Mr Holtz…' Angelus said_

_'No no…'_

_'Never mind - I'll tell him me self,' and he tore into her neck, piercing her jugular and draining her of her blood._

_..._

_Holtz kicked down the door - and glanced around. The place was empty. 'Where are they?' he demanded. He took a few paces inside, and it was then he saw the note._ 'How do you hope to save others when you cannot save your own?'

_And for once, Holtz knew fear - real dread, like a sickness taking over. But he showed no outward sign. 'They are at my house.' He turned and left the building the pair had used as a decoy, mounted his horse and galloped for home._

_..._

_The baby was crying. 'Can something be done about that horrible noise?' Angelus asked._

_'He wants his mother,' Darla told him, 'let's send him to her.'_

_'Do you want to do it - or shall I?'_

_..._

_After an hours furious riding, Holtz arrived at his own home. He jumped down from his horse and ran for the house - kicking the door in, in his hurry. But he was too late. As he entered the parlour, he found Caroline lying on the floor - her eyes were blank, and there were twin puncture wounds on her neck._

* * *

Darla lay on Angel's bed, her eyes were closed and she was finally resting. Angel sat down beside her and reached out his hand. Then he hesitated, his hand hovering above her pregnant belly. Slowly, he lowered it - and felt the life beneath her skin. Darla's hand crept up, and covered Angel's own. 'Are you gonna do it?' she asked, 'or should I?'

* * *

Holtz sat in the underground chamber. There were four TV screens stacked together, and each flashed scenes of world history on them. Daniel was catching up - he had been sleeping for over two centuries - and according to the demon who had brought him here, much had changed.

'What of England?' Holtz asked, thinking of his sceptered isle - that blessed plot, that other Eden… home. 'Has it survived the years and destruction?'

The demon told him it had - more or less. There would always be an England… though things were better here in L.A. It asked the vampire hunter if he had followed the history of the Americas. Holtz shook his head - there was something he did not understand; in all these years, these wars, with all these weapons of destruction - how was it no one had yet killed Angelus and Darla?

But the answer was simple enough - they were not dead yet, because their fate and Holtz's own were intertwined. That was why he had been brought here. The demon had waited two and a half centuries to have Angelus killed… and Holtz was his best hope for that. 'You have been tracking him all this time?' asked the vampire hunter.

The demon admitted he had - but not the way Holtz thought. He was able to slip between dimensions - to live in worlds where time stood still, and observe from there. 'And that is why you look the same?' asked Holtz.

'That - and I had a little work done. Mostly around the eyes.' Then he told the vampire hunter to get some rest - he was going to need it.

* * *

The team were down in the lobby, working on the scrolls. Wesley was transcribing as much as he could, whilst Cordelia aided him by using the books to cross reference oblique information. Doyle sat at the computer and also typed translations into the search bar - hoping to find a hit on the net. Fred was frowning, as she wrestled with her calculations - trying to pinpoint just how many crunch moments there were, to better give them idea of how many steps were in the Tro-Clon. Gunn stood as sentry, holding his crossbow in case Darla got past Angel and made a break for the door.

'Dammit!' Cordelia slammed her book shut, 'this is all too vague! There are too many possibilities… too many words,' she narrowed her eyes at Wesley, 'you're gonna have to narrow this down, buddy - a whole lot.'

'She's not wrong,' Doyle agreed. He twisted around from the computer screen so he could look at the others, 'I'm gettin' nothin' on this… the Tro-Clon will be born, or arise or wake up or fall outta helicopter or… whatever. We need to know what verb we're actually lookin' at here. Until then ...I'm blind.'

'Too true,' Gunn sniffed, 'and when'd it happen anyway, last March? When Darla arrived? A couple of hours ago? Just how many Tro-Clons are there?'

Wesley began to frown, he looked across at the woman responsible for the math. 'Gunn has a point, Fred. Your calculations… have you proven any of them wrong yet?'

'No,' she told him, 'but I haven't proven any of them right either… I'm just keepin' goin' until somethin' makes sense. It's got to at some point… math never lets me down.'

'But what if they're all right?' Wesley pondered. He scanned through his scroll and then pointed to a word, 'here… this word in Ga-shundi, turned into Greek it reads as 'symvoli'...'

He showed Cordelia his writing and she squinted at the symbols he had drawn, 'if you say so…'

'I do… now put straight into English it comes out as 'contribution', which is how I've been reading it… but it can mean different things. Co-operation, a junction… or a confluence.' He stared at his own work for a moment, and then... 'Confluence, yes - if I turn that into Latin it becomes 'profecti confluentis'... confluens… literally flowing together. And if I translate that back into the Gashundi… I get… conflux.'

'And in English that all means?' Gunn asked.

'It isn't only Angel's kid,' Doyle said slowly.

Wesley nodded, 'the reason Fred has so many dates in her working is because the Tro-Clon is not one event or person… but a confluence of them. Many elements working together to bring about…'

'The end of the world?' suggested Cordy. 'Great - so instead of one thing to be looking out for, we now have several. Hey!' a thought hit her, 'if it's more than one thing… is there a chance that Darla's pregnancy is just a coincidence and that Angel's kid doesn't have to be - you know - _the destroyer?_ '

'I should think not,' Wesley shook his head, and the woman working beside him looked glum. 'Another way of translating 'confluence' into Latin is 'conceptus',' the watcher explained.

'You mean conception,' Doyle said, 'you mean Angel gettin' Darla pregnant? Last March?'

'Precisely.'

'OK then… maybe it's time we think outside the box?' Gunn suggested, nodding along with the conversation. 'We know that the Tro-Clon is a big bad, end of days kinda deal… and we know Angel's kid is a part of that - couldn't we just… get rid of it?'

'Kill Angel's child?' Wesley sounded aghast at the idea.

But Gunn stuck to his point, 'no more baby - no more Tro-Clon. Way I see it, we either go up there and behead Darla now - or wait for it to skitter out, and then get to beheadin'.'

'It's human,' Doyle told him, though his voice was heavy, 'it's not gonna "skitter out". We're talkin' about hours of labour and then a real, human baby. And whichever way we decide… Angel won't let us. He won't let us kill his child until it's absolutely necessary - and then he'll do it himself.'

'So we just let this Tro-Clon happen?' Gunn asked.

The Irishman shrugged, 'or we try to work out what some of the other events and players in the confluence are - see if we can't kill one of those.'

There was a sudden moan of agony that came from upstairs - but was loud enough to be heard even in the lobby; a pained bellow, followed by some whimpering. All heads whipped upwards. 'Did that sound like…' Cordelia began.

'Contractions,' Fred finished for her, looking upwards, 'Darla's going into labour.'

* * *

Lilah pricked her finger with a needle and then signed the document in her own blood. She blew on the paper to dry it off, and then looked up as the mail guy came in. 'can you take this down to Pinderhook in demon resources?' she asked.

He took it from her and turned to leave - and then he seemed to change his mind, and turned back to her, 'uh - Miss Morgan?' She looked up at him, irritated. He held out a CD case, 'I've been thinking that maybe you ought to know about this.'

Her brow creased into frown lines, as she took the case from him, and slipped the CD into her computer. Her expression became one of startled horror when she saw what it contained - a grainy, black and white image of her and Angel groping on the desk, before he vamped out and bit her. She was on her feet in an instant, and slammed the mail guy against the wall. 'You little weasel! You think you can blackmail me?'

'No no - you got it all wrong,' he protested, 'it's just - in the mail room - we see a lot, different factions, you know. And there comes a time when we have to pick a side.'

'And is this your way of telling me you've picked my side?' she asked. He nodded, and she smiled her shark's smile at him, 'and so who are we allied against, you and I? Who is our common foe?'

'Mr - Mr. Park' the mail guy stuttered out.

'Gavin.' Lilah looked grim. She went to retrieve the disk - and then went to find Gavin's base of operation.

* * *

Cordelia and Fred had flown into action, on hearing the cries of the pregnant vampire. Towels were collected, water was boiled and they tried to shoo the men out of the room. None of the men were inclined to leave, however. Much as none of them wanted to witness a labour, first hand, they were equally unwilling to leave the women alone with Darla. 'She can't bite us… again,' Cordelia protested, 'she's in too much pain.'

'We're not risking it, Cordelia,' Doyle told her - and the other men nodded their agreement.

The woman sighed. 'OK,' she said, 'men and crossbows up the head end - no peeking. Me and Fred will keep an axe and deal with the business end … and we all pray for an easy delivery.'

'And if skitters out I'm cuttin' its head off,' Gunn muttered.

'Angel - hold her hand - and no matter how hard she squeezes… you did this to her buddy, suck it up,' Cordy instructed. 'How far apart are the contractions?' she asked Fred.

'Every twenty minutes, still not regular.'

'Right we have time … which is good… because I need to go look up "how to deliver a baby" on the internet. Towels and water - that's all I know.'

'I'm pretty sure it'll happen, whether y' know what y' doin' or not, Princess,' Doyle told her, 'women have been givin' birth since the dawn o' time… since way before they invented towels.'

'That's… comforting.'

Darla shrieked out in agony again. 'The pain' she cried, 'something's wrong.'

'It's supposed to hurt,' Angel said, squeezing her hand, 'this is normal.'

'Nothing about this is normal,' Darla growled, 'it hurts too much - something is wrong!'

Cordelia chewed on her lip, 'if there's something wrong…' she said, 'then this is beyond me… I can just about cope with an ordinary labour… but I don't wanna take any chances with Angel's kid.'

* * *

'How about that,' Lilah said, when she found the dark, underground room Gavin was working in, 'I just asked myself "if I were a cockroach, where would I be?" and _voila_ \- here you are!' She held up the disc, 'if you thought you could blackmail me with this…'

But Gavin cut her off with a chuckle - no one cared enough to blackmail her, he just thought it was time that she understand the full scope of what it was he was trying to achieve. The mail guy poked his head around the door - and Gavin thanked him.

'What was all that crap about choosing sides?' Lilah asked, annoyed.

'He chose a side - mine.'

She came into the room and looked at all the monitors arrayed along the desk - each showing a different room in the Hyperion. There was a transcriber sitting at one of the computers, writing out the words from one of the video feeds. He was currently working on a tape of Angel and Cordelia training.

'Is this your pathetic and convoluted way of asking for my help?' Lilah asked him, 'because you sure need it.' She picked up a file and began to flick through it, 'you're understaffed, underfunded and clearly undertalented. So what have we learned?'

'We? There is no "we".'

'Who is this unidentified pregnant female?' she interrupted Gavin, and spoke to the transcriber.

The transcriber admitted he didn't know, 'We lost audio for a couple of days last week. I can pull the tape.'

'See?' she smirked at the real estate lawyer, 'need me.'

The transcriber located the relevant tape and put it into the VCR. It showed the lobby, most of the team - including the half breed she had sworn off harming - were round the counter, but Angel and Cordelia were sat on the sofa, and they looked like they were holding hands … or something. Lilah nodded to herself, even if she had agreed to end her vendetta against Doyle, it couldn't hurt to know if something was going on between his trophy girlfriend and the caped crusader. But then all thoughts of infidelity flew out of her mind, as the unidentified pregnant woman walked into the lobby - and the whole team stopped what they were doing to stare.

Lilah stared as well - this couldn't be. 'Darla?' she said.

Gavin frowned, 'Darla?' He had never seen the female vampire before, this must be a mistake. 'That's impossible,' he told Lilah, 'vampires can't give birth.'

Ignoring him, the female attorney pulled out her cell and dialled up her boss. 'Linwood,' she said into the phone, 'you're not going to believe what I'm looking at.'


	30. Quickening: Part Two

Darla sat in a chair and moaned. The team moved a little bit away from her, so they could talk in hushed whispers about what to do for the best. 'Doyle's right,' Angel was saying, 'women have been delivering babies since before time was time. My mother gave birth to me in a carriage ride on the way to Athenry. No painkillers - _no towels_. She was fine.'

'Yeah? And how many women weren't fine?' Cordelia asked him, 'newsflash hotshot - it's not the 1720s anymore. This is happening to Darla. She's the one feeling this - if she says something is wrong, I think we ought to listen to her. I've got a first aid certificate, not a midwife's degree. I don't wanna mess this up.'

'So what do we do?' Doyle asked, 'she's already tried shamans and seers… they couldn't help her.'

'But I guess she never went to, like, a normal doctor or a hospital,' said Fred.

'There's an idea! A real hospital,' said Cordy, 'except - no wait, they don't admit vampires.' Her tone was sarcastic.

But Gunn was having an idea, 'well - what about a demony doctor - one who knows how vampire girl parts work?'

'You got the number for one of those?' asked Cordy, still sounding sarcastic.

But the street fighter just shrugged, 'not me - no, but Doyle does.'

Everyone turned to look at the half demon, who was looking as confused as everyone else, 'I do?' he asked.

'Yeah, man - remember months ago, that crazy ass vampire got his heart cut out at that demon clinic? That was the demon clinic you were going to for a health check up. That was your demony doctor he used. Maybe that guy could help us?'

Doyle looked awkward. He hadn't been there for a routine health check up, he had gone there for his fertility tests. It wasn't a service he normally used. But Wesley was nodding along, 'of course - the slod demon - he might be our best bet, if we take Darla to him...'

'He's a collector,' Doyle warned, 'if he helps us here, he's gonna want somethin' - somethin' big.'

'We'll worry about payment later,' Wesley said, 'I really do think this may be our best course of action - Angel?'

The vampire looked like he wanted to disagree, like he didn't want to risk bringing someone else in on the birth of his child. But, behind him, Darla let out another loud moan of pain, and he glanced back at her, and then looked at his friends, nodding. 'OK,' he said, 'let's get ready to move her.'

* * *

The three lawyers marched down the corridor of Wolfram and Hart, making their way to the conference room. 'If the Senior Partners hear about this…' Linwood was saying.

'They won't,' Gavin assured him, 'that's why we came straight to you.'

The older lawyer shook his head, 'Darla - pregnant. How could we miss this?'

'I'm sequestering the psychics and the mind readers in the conference room,' Lilah told him, 'we'll get to the bottom of this.'

But Linwood was feeling reflective. A man worked hard - watched things grow - made himself rich and powerful - left his wife for a younger model. They were the reasons one took certain blood oaths - and to have it all vanish because …

'Sir,' Lilah interrupted him, 'I cannot stress enough. There is no way we could have foreseen this.'

'She's right,' Gavin agreed, 'no one could have known.'

...

Unnoticed by the three lawyers, the guy from the mail room peeked out of a doorway and watched them pass. He took out his cell and dialled. He reached voicemail. 'Hi you've reached the Tittle's,' a woman's voice said, 'for Christine press one,' the voice became a man's, 'for Bentley, press two.' The next voice was deep and gravelly. ' _Or to speak to or worship Master Tarfall, underlord of pain, press three._ '

The mail guy hit three, 'master,' he whispered, 'it has happened, The thing you had foreseen has come to be. We must tell the others.'

* * *

_Holtz sat before the fire, his eyes closed. In his mind, he played the death scene of his beloved family, over and over. It had been nine long years - but the pain was still raw - and Angelus and Darla had slipped through his grasp once again._

_'Another step and it will be your last,' he said suddenly, 'if you've come for anything other than a fight, then you've come to the wrong place.'_

' _Actually - a fight is exactly what I've come for,' a voice said to him._

_The vampire stood up and looked around - he saw nothing. 'Be a man - and show your face.'_

' _I'm not a man… what I mean is…'_

' _You're not human.' This intruder was a demon._

' _But clearly male, you get that right?'_

_Holtz picked up his pistol and pointed it straight at the creature's chest, warning him he would find more than a fight if he didn't leave at once. The demon nodded - his mistake - he just thought Holtz might want some help killing Angelus and Darla._

_Holtz turned away from him, 'I don't need your help. I'll kill them myself.'_

_But the demon begged to differ. Without his help, the vampire hunter would die a bitter old man - and never see his prey again. Holtz hesitated for a moment and then, 'you don't know that.'_

' _Actually I do. I know it will be two centuries before you have a chance to confront either of them again.'_

' _And this is the part where the demon offers a chance to change all that?' Holtz replied, scornfully. The demon agreed - that was what he was offering. He would take Holtz to them - two centuries into the future._

' _With black magic and sorcery?'_

' _No - on the back of a mule cart… of course with black magic and sorcery - I'm a demon.'_

' _And what do you want from me?'_

' _Your word,' the demon replied, 'that when you see them again you will show them no mercy.'_

_The vampire hunter didn't say anything, he turned to look into the spitting flames, imagining Caroline - dead on the floor - once more… and little Sarah…_

' _I don't want to be pushy,' the demon said, 'but this is a limited offer. Say yes - and I'll take you to them this very hour. Say no - and realise that the one chance to avenge what they did to your wife and children has slipped away - forever.'_

_Still - the vampire hunter did not speak._

* * *

Doyle called the clinic from down in the lobby - to make sure that they could come in. He didn't mention the specifics of the problem… he was far too wary of what Dr. Gregson might ask for, if he knew in advance that he was about to deliver a miracle child. But he told the receptionist enough - a demon pregnancy in trouble - urgent medical help needed.

...

Gunn went to go and bring the car around; upstairs Angel, Wesley and Fred made preparations for moving Darla. 'How are you doing?' Angel asked the mother of his child.

'I think the contractions have stopped,' she told him.

The others all looked at each other. 'Is that good?' Angel asked.

Wesley moved towards the pregnant vampire and, after gaining her permission, held his hand against her belly - feeling the position of the child. 'It might be that you were experiencing what are known as Braxton-Hicks contractions,' he told her, 'a form of false labour.'

'So she isn't having the baby yet?' asked Fred.

'We'll know more when we get her to the doctor,' Wesley replied, 'but it may be a good thing for now - Darla's journey will be easier if she isn't experiencing labour pains.' They began to help her to her feet - and started the slow journey down to the lobby.

...

Cordelia was waiting for Doyle, when he hung up the phone. 'You doing OK?' she asked him.

'Me? ...yeah'

'Really… because taking your vampire friend's pregnant ex to the doctor who told you you could never have children of your own, might be the kind of thing that made lesser men feel cranky.'

'Well - you know me… Mr. Big.'

She giggled, and wrapped her arms around him, 'don't flatter yourself, there, Mr. slightly smaller than average.'

'Hey! You better be talkin' about my height and absolutely _nothin'_ else!' He gave her a mock stern glance, and she returned a wide eyed innocent stare. They both laughed, but then Cordelia turned serious and asked her question again, 'you really OK with this?' her voice was soft, and her expression concerned, now.

Doyle sighed, 'I guess I have to be. If the world's gonna end… I gotta accept there are more important things to worry about than my feelin's, yeah?'

'I love you,' she kissed him.

'I love you too.'

Gunn came through the front door, then. 'Car's ready,' he announced, 'are we off?'

* * *

Holtz paced up and down, he was tired of waiting. Determined to make this demon take him to Angelus, he reached out to grab him - aiming to force him into action. But the vampire hunter's hand simply passed right through him, as if he was mist.

The demon just looked at him, 'do you really think I'd go to all the trouble of transporting you two and a half centuries if I could simply walk up to Angelus and stake him myself? Please! There are rules and timetables and forces at work that are far greater than either of us.' He then ran his hands across his face, and his demon visage smoothed out and turned human looking. 'It's my street face,' he said, 'now come on, I've lined up some men to help us.'

* * *

'Correct me if I'm wrong,' Linwood said to the psychic stood in front of him, 'but isn't the job of a psychic - to be psychic? To predict the future? So that Wolfram and Hart doesn't find itself in this kind of predicament?'

'I can't apologise enough sir.'

'You right, you can't - but I'm not without compassion. I'm gonna give you a chance to save your job - and your skin.'

The psychic sighed with relief, but then leaned forward and frowned, staring into Linwood's eyes. 'No you're not - you're gonna have me killed.' A plastic bag was suddenly forced over his head, from behind, and he was suffocated.

Linwood smiled, 'now why couldn't you have had that kind of foresight when we needed it?'

The entire conference room was buzzing; filled with mind readers and psychics trying to ascertain what was going on, and who knew what. Lilah approached her boss. 'Intelligence is just coming in. No one seems to know how Darla could be pregnant. Apparently there is some form of prophecy that predicts a vampire birth, but the scrolls are missing.'

Linwood looked annoyed, 'do you have any idea how many cults and sects are going to want to get their hands on this thing? We need to get it first.'

'We will.'

'And then we need to dissect it and find out what it means.'

Gavin stepped forward, holding out a phone, 'Berlin's on the phone for you, sir.'

Linwood sighed, 'oh God, if Berlin have heard about this, then Singapore and Muncie can't be far behind.' He looked at his two subordinates, 'if The Senior Partners find out about this - the buck stops here, understand?'

Lilah didn't - so he spelled it out for her. 'They're going to want someone to blame, and I'm going to have to step forward.'

'That's inspiring, sir.'

'I'm going to have step forward and blame _you_.' He told her, 'Darla was resurrected on your watch. I can think of no better scapegoat.' He walked off to take the phone call with Berlin.

Gavin began to smirk. Lilah scowled at him. 'If you think this is over, just watch - rookie.' She took out her own phone and made a call.

* * *

The mystic meditated in front of a candle. His eyes were closed; he wore nothing but a turban and a loin cloth. He opened his hand, revealing a crumpled piece of paper - which suddenly burst into flames on his palm. He kept his eyes closed until he heard the phone ring. He picked up the receiver and listened, 'yes, I understand,' he said. He opened his eyes, extinguished the candle between his fingertips and got to his feet. Across the room from him, a curved blade stood against the wall. He stared at it for a moment - and then it flew, by itself, into his hand.

* * *

They put Darla into the middle of the back seat. Angel sat beside her and Wesley was on her other side. Fred squashed in between the watcher and the door. Doyle and Cordy piled into the front seat, and Gunn was in the driving seat. 'Just keep an eye on her,' Doyle said, nodding at the pregnant vampire, 'I don't want her getting hungry and makin' a snack o' Cordy again.'

'I brought some pig's blood with us,' Fred piped up.

Darla lay her head back against the seat, and kept her eyes closed. The Irishman looked at her, mistrust in his eyes. 'I don't think pig's blood's gonna be enough for her,' he said. 'She's cravin' the real thing because of that thing inside of her...'

'Hey - don't call my kid a _thing_!' Angel interrupted.

'And the younger and purer the blood, the better,' Doyle finished up - as if he hadn't been interrupted.

'Can we just go already?' Darla sighed, still with her eyes closed. 'I won't bite - I just want this thing out of me. You crazy kids are the ones making that happen… I'm not gonna bite any of you.'

'Yeah - come on - let's get this show on the road,' Angel said, 'the sooner we know - the better everything will be. Let's get to the doctor. Why aren't we moving?'

'We're surrounded by vampires,' Gunn told him.

'No it's only me and Darla - and Darla's said she won't bite.'

'No brain trust -' Cordelia pointed through the windshield. 'We're surrounded by vampires.'

'Oh.'

The car was encircled by scores of vampires, all moving in towards them. 'Pedal to the metal, Gunn!' Angel called, 'knock em all down.'

Gunn attempted to turn on the ignition - 'I don't have the keys!'

'What? How can you not have the keys? You had them when you brought the car around.' Wesley did not sound impressed.

'I guess I left 'em in the car, when I came back to get y'all…'

The vampire directly in front of the car held up the keys. Doyle groaned.

'We are so enormously dead,' Cordelia whispered beside him.

Once the vampires were within a foot of the car, and surrounding it on all sides, they came to a stop and looked down at the small group of people. 'The miracle child,' the lead vampire pronounced. His words were echoed in a whisper by all the other vampires, and then - as one - they fell to their knees and bowed down.

The gang peered out at them in confusion.


	31. Quickening: Part Three

Holtz and the demon walked down the street. The demon was telling the vampire hunter about the world he now found himself in. Buildings were bigger, machines were more powerful, and you could buy anything you wanted at any hour of the day or night… but people were still just the same. They drank too much, they fought, they worked - they fell in love.

'They have families,' Holtz said. The demon agreed with his words, yes they still had families.

'I hope these men you have hired are ruthless bastards.'

They approached a door, and the demon knocked on it. A voice inside told them to go away, 'it's me - Sahjahn,' the demon told the voice - and the door opened. 'This is where you'll get your men,' he said to Holtz, 'it's very exclusive.'

Holtz looked around the place in distaste. The club was like a gym, and the people training in it had grey skin and walrus tusks that curved downwards. 'These are not men,' he said to Sahjahn.

'Again - sex not species,' the demon sighed. 'I should have said "minions", Have you seen Graplar demons fight? Not the sharpest pencils in the box, but merciless in battle.' Then he called the demons over, telling them to come and meet their new boss. He looked at Holtz, 'ready to command your troops, captain?'

Holtz stared back at him, 'any more surprises I should know about?'

* * *

The team stared out at the kneeling vampires. 'This reminds me of Pylea,' Cordelia said, 'I'm all for being idolised, but - what the hell is going on?'

Darla pried one of her eyes open, and looked at the vampires. 'What is this?' she asked, sounding irritated..

'We are here to protect the miracle child,' the lead vampire said to her, keeping his voice hushed and respectful.

'Protect?' Angel asked, 'that's good then … we're all here for the same thing.'

But his hopes of talking sensibly with the demons that surrounded them were rudely interrupted by Lilah's hired hit man. With a sudden scream of 'die' the mystic came somersaulting down from the roof of the Hyperion, clutching his scimitar. He landed on the road - and pointed his blade at Darla… and was then pounced on by the cult of vampires. They jumped him, en masse, and he went down with a strangled cry. There was a crunching noise, and the sound of liquid being gulped. The humans in the car all pulled disgusted faces. When the vampires left the body of the mystic, their mouths were stained red.

'As it has been prophesied,' the lead vampire exclaimed, 'by our great potentate Ul-thar, we vow our lives to protect this special child.'

'You hear that?' Angel asked Darla, 'our kid - special.' Doyle threw him a disbelieving look.

'Now,' the lead vampire said, 'let us kill the humans so we may use their blood to nourish the mother - and her special child.'

They reached into the car and hauled out everyone except Darla - who stretched out in the back and smiled, 'looks like I'm getting something better than pig's blood after all.'

* * *

Gavin flipped through the blueprints in his hand, and showed them to the man beside him. 'Commander, this should provide your ops team with a solid tactical base,' he said. The blueprints were of the Hyperion, and showed every level of the hotel - including all the entrances and exits. Using the bugs he had planted, months ago - the lawyer would monitor the operation from his own office.

The commander thanked him, and looked through the schematics himself. He was confident his men would be able to capture the target… but he was less sure on extracting the cargo that the target was carrying. Linwood looked at him in confusion, and Gavin smiled and translated for him, 'getting the baby from Darla.'

'Ah - of course,' the older lawyer nodded, 'and for that we have brought in an expert.'

'You flatter me, sir,' a new voice said - it was heavily accented and held a note of something … eldritch and more than a little sinister in it.

The two attorneys turned to look. Lilah had just entered the room - and she was followed by a tall man dressed in a long black cloak. 'Gentlemen,' Lilah said to them, 'may I introduce Dr. Fetvanovitch from our satellite office in the Balkans. He is the world's foremost specialist in paranormal obstetrics. We are _very_ fortunate he's consented to help.'

'It is I who feel fortunate,' the doctor smiled. Just like his voice, his smile was disquieting. 'A vampire birth is - unprecedented. I look forward to dissecting both the mother and the child.'

* * *

The vampire cult attempted to hold the gang in their grasp. There were many of them, but the team were used to fighting against the odds - and immediately launched into a counter offensive. Angel swung a punch at the nearest vampire, ducked the returning fist and then slammed the demon against the car and staked him. 'You might wanna join in the fighting,' he said to Darla, who still sat in the back of the car - enjoying the show.

She smiled up at him, 'sorry, darling, but I'm just gonna have to be Switzerland and sit this one out.'

Leaving her to it, Angel turned back to the fight. He knew he and Gunn could give the vampires a good rout - he just wanted the others to get away to safety and take Darla with them - get her to the doctor's so they could find out what was going on. But for the time being, they were hemmed into the alleyway, unable to move - and exchanging furious blows with their attackers.

...

'Doyle!' Cordelia squealed, as her boyfriend took a blow to the face and was knocked to the ground. He morphed into his spikes and launched himself at the vampire, head butting him. The vampire staggered backwards, screaming, clutching his face where the brachen prickles had gouged at him. 'Doyle - quit fighting and get in that car and hot wire it!' Cordelia instructed him.

Recovered, the vampire came back for another attack, but the half demon forced him away again and turned to look at his girlfriend. 'I can't leave y' unprotected!'

'Enough with the macho crap! You're only a so so fighter, but you're a champion petty criminal. We need to get outta here - hot wire that car!'

He opened his mouth to argue, and then seemed to change his mind - as he nodded and hopped into the driver's seat. Ignoring Darla, who was still in the back, he stripped back the column and took out the wires.

As the vampire rushed back at Cordelia, she moved her weight to the balls of her feet - just like Angel had taught her in her training, and swung her fist. She hit him directly in the nose but, as it was a vampire, it barely slowed him down. He jumped onto her… and this time she used the technique Angel had taught her to use her own opponent's momentum against him - and throw him off. It felt very different - the real thing - from those intimate moments with Angel, down in the basement - contorting her body into positions it didn't want to go in.

But it worked.

The vampire hit the ground. As he got back up, Cordy span on her heel, thrusting her leg out and striking him in the chest - again, just the way she had been shown. She wasn't lying when she said she only had to be a shown a move once - and her reflexes and coordination had always been second to none. As the vampire slammed into the hood of the car, she rammed a stake deep into his heart - and he exploded into a cloud of dust.

In the driver's seat, Doyle stopped what he was doing to look up at her, in amazement, 'wow - Cordelia - that was… wow.'

But she just tutted, 'I don't hear hotwiring,' she said, and turned back into the fray.

...

There were too many vampires, however, they were closing in - outnumbering the gang. Even though Cordy and all the men had successfully staked someone, the demons did not stop coming. And under the pressure of the fight around him, Doyle was struggling to get the wires to spark together.

As she ducked under the fist of one vampire, and scurried away from another - Fred decided that this situation needed brains not brawn.

Beside her, Gunn was knocked to the ground, she knelt beside him, 'do you have a weapon I could borrow?' she hissed. He handed her a dagger, before getting back to his feet and continuing the fight. But getting his violence on was short lived - as Fred jumped into the backseat, grabbed hold of Darla and held the dagger to her belly. 'Everybody stop!' she yelled.

The whole alleyway went quiet, as all the fighters turned to look at her. 'You're all gonna back off right now, or I'm gonna slice the miracle kid into miracle triplets,' she announced.

The vampires immediately backed away, their hands held up in surrender. 'Wait…' the leader started to say.

'Shut up!' Fred commanded, 'You freaks are gonna get out of our way.'

'It's always the quiet ones,' Cordelia muttered to herself.

'Angel - everybody… get back in the car,' Fred said. Quietly, the team did as they were told - and the vampires let them. The tiny woman kept the dagger held against Darla the whole time.

The sound of the engine springing to life suddenly rent through the quiet space, 'I did it!' Doyle cried, 'hang on!' and he floored the gas and drove the car down the alleyway.

Fred relaxed her grip on Darla, 'sorry about that,' she said, 'I never intended to hurt you.'

'Not at all,' Darla said, 'I was quite … impressed.' Fred blushed at her praise.

The lead vampire began to chase them down - and flung himself at the car, just catching onto it's rear bumper as it sped away. He was dragged along for a moment, and then pulled himself upwards. 'I will protect the miracle child,' he cried. But as he climbed onto the trunk and edged his way towards the backseat, Angel grabbed him, wearing his vamp face, and threw him down into the car. Gunn staked him and he disintegrated into dust. 'Oh hey - look - the keys!' Angel smiled, picking his car keys up from the pile of ashes that had once been the cult leader.

The car squealed out onto the main road, and Doyle weaved in and out of the lanes of traffic - trying to put as much distance as possible between themselves and the vampires. 'So - uh - what now?' he asked.

* * *

The lobby lay still and dark and deserted - just as the team had left it. The first commando - wearing a ski mask - came in from the basement and scanned around. He spoke into his radio, 'all clear.' Two more commandos rappelled down from the upper storey, and a group burst in through the main doors. They were followed by Dr. Fetvanovitch, carrying his black medicine bag.

'Lobby secure, sir,' the commando said to him.

The doctor nodded, and walked through the wide open space. His bird like, clawed feet clacked against the hard floor. 'Let's set up out here,' he said, looking around, 'Oh - and get a hose, I'm afraid there might be some blood. You can set baby's cage down next to mama's.'


	32. Quickening: Part Four

'OK - we just need to get to the clinic before she goes into labour for real,' Angel said, as the car drove down the road. Doyle glanced over his shoulder, and then turned off the main road, and pulled up. The engine spluttered and died, as he took his foot off the gas. 'What are you doing?' the vampire asked him.

The half demon twisted himself in his seat, so he could look at his friend in the backseat. 'Look, man - I think we need a new plan.'

'But…'

'Dr. Gregson is a _collector_ ,' Doyle spelled it out to him, 'of rare and precious demonic… _things_. We can't just walk into his clinic, ask him to deliver a vampire baby - and then expect to walk out with it. He'll ask a steep price - that price will almost certainly be the kid.'

'Let him have it,' Darla said, 'I don't want it… I just want it out of me.'

But the two men ignored her, as they continued to argue. 'You said this was the best place to take her,' Angel said heatedly.

'Actually - _Gunn_ said this was the best place to take her. I just facilitated it,' Doyle bit back.

'Naw man. Don't bring me into this,' Gunn protested, but like Darla - he too was ignored.

'So what? All of a sudden you've changed your mind - just like that?'

'No, bud, not 'just like that' - we just got attacked by a cult of vampires wantin' to worship your oh so special miracle child, if you hadn't noticed. Things have changed. I've seen first hand how much this kid o' yours is worth - and what people are willin' to do to get their hands on it. If you wanna protect your baby, Angel, you can't take him to a collector.'

'Or her,' Darla interrupted.

'I really don't think pronouns are the issue right now, Darla,' Angel snapped, 'right - we don't go to the doctor - what do you suggest?'

'I'm not the boss,' Doyle pointed out. They both looked at Wesley.

'Well,' the watcher mused, 'I suppose we had better go somewhere safe,' he said.

'Yeah - and we better get there soon,' the pregnant vampire added, 'I'm famished and we all know how ugly that can get.' Fred handed her some of the pig's blood she had brought along. Darla took it, but her thanks sounded less than grateful.

'OK- somewhere safe,' Cordelia said from up front, 'I'm guessing back to the hotel is out?'

'That's the first place anyone will go to look for us,' Angel agreed. 'Maybe we should get out of town.'

'How about…' Gunn sounded hopeful, as he started to speak, but the vampire cut him off. 'Vegas? Sorry Gunn, too high profile.'

'Where then, man?' Doyle asked, ' if we're all agreed we need to get out of dodge.'

'Actually…' it was Wesley that sounded the dissent.

Cordelia sighed, 'God! I hate it when you say that word. 'Actually' means that your oversized gi-normous brain thought of something that the rest of us failed to consider, right?'

'It's just - other people seem to know a lot more about this child's importance than we do,' the watcher told the others. Doyle and Gunn nodded along with him - seeing the truth in what he was saying. 'The only thing that can help us is back at the hotel.' He turned to Angel, 'we can't protect your child unless we get the scrolls.'

'OK then,' Angel nodded,'quick stop.'

'And then where?' Doyle asked.

'Anywhere but here.'

* * *

The commando patrolling the courtyard, outside of the Hyperion, spun around as he thought he heard a noise. His flashlight failed to pick anything up, however, and he turned back to his guard duties. He was felled by a blow to the skull from behind, and Holtz swept past him and entered the hotel.

...

Inside the lobby, Dr. Fetvanovitch was laying out his instruments - cruel looking, sharp and vicious implements that would do nothing to aid bringing a baby into the world, but could do much damage when it came to tearing one apart. He turned, when he heard the front door click shut. The chief commando aimed his gun at the incomer.

'Is this man with you?' the doctor asked the commando, frowning at Holtz.

Holtz stared down the barrel of the gun, calmly - and without fear. 'Where is Angelus?' he asked.

* * *

Back at the office, Linwood peered into the monitor and scowled. 'Who is the pirate in the middle of my operation?' he asked. Lilah shook her head- she didn't recognise him - but she noted that he called Angel by his old name. The monitor crackled and they lost sound, 'I need better audio,' Linwood demanded. The transcriber fiddled with the wires, and the crackling died away.

'Hand over the vampires,' the short pirate on the screen said to the Wolfram and Hart agents.

Linwood lost patience and gave the order for the man to be taken out - he didn't care who he was, he wanted him dead. Back in the hotel the chief commando relayed the message to his men - and they closed in on Holtz - guns pointed.

Back at Wolfram and Hart the screen flickered and then fused. The picture was gone - but the sound came in crystal clear. There was a blast of gunfire - and then a lot of screaming. Gavin smiled, 'this shouldn't take long, Burke's never lost.'

'Picture?' Linwood asked the transcriber.

'Working on it.'

There was one last prolonged and heartfelt scream, which exuded from the monitor and then reverberated round the ops room back at the office. Lilah smirked, 'that ought to do it.' Linwood began to talk into his radio - asking what had happened - did anyone read him? Static crackled down the line… but no human voice answered.

* * *

'Pull in here,' Angel said to Doyle. Dutifully, the half demon switched on his indicator and turned into a dark alleyway. 'OK, stop,' the vampire commanded. Doyle put the car in park, but left the engine idling.

Cordelia twisted in her seat to look at Angel, 'why are we stopping here?' she asked.

'It's only a couple of blocks to the hotel,' Angel said, 'I'll go the rest of the way on foot.'

'Y' want me to come with?' Doyle asked.

But the vampire shook his head. 'It'll be quicker and safer alone. Where are the scrolls?' he aimed his last sentence at Wesley.

'I was working on them at the front desk when…' the watcher glanced over at Darla, 'we got interrupted,' he finished.

'Right,' Angel nodded, 'if I'm not back in five minutes, leave.'

Cordelia scrunched her face up, 'leave to where, exactly?'

'Anywhere, somewhere safe … Doyle?'

'I'll find somewhere safe to take her,' the Irishman promised, 'and Cordelia can do the whole delivering the baby thing… we'll be fine.'

'Angel?' It was Darla who spoke his name. Still sat in the back of the car, her arms wrapped around her swollen belly - she looked exhausted and vulnerable.

The vampire was by her side in a moment, 'yeah?'

But then she shook her head, changing her mind about whatever she had been planning to say. 'Just get out of here,' she told him.

Angel jumped onto the hood of the car, and from there onto the bottom rung of a fire escape that hung from the nearest building. He scaled the ladder, and then took off over the rooftops. Doyle watched him go, 'yep,' he sighed, 'I guess he is quicker goin' alone.'

* * *

Angel landed on the rooftop of the Hyperion, next to the neon sign, and entered through the door that gave the building roof access. He slipped down the stairs, alert for any presence - wary of any remaining vampire cult members, or any other demons that might want to steal and worship his child - or worse. But there was a hush all over the place, it was deadly still. He ran along the landing, and then down the main staircase and into the lobby - intending to head for the front desk where Wesley informed him the Nyazian scrolls should be.

But as he stepped into the wide open space of the hotel's foyer - he became aware of the destruction all around him. Slaughtered men in ski masks littered the floor. A tray of evil looking metal instruments had been upturned, next to two cages - a big and a small one. A man, dressed all in black, lay dead beside them - and Angel stared in surprise at the clawed chicken feet that stuck out from the man's trouser legs.

There was a footstep behind him. 'Angelus,' a voice said.

Angel whirled around to look who it was. His mouth dropped open in shock, as he recognised this newcomer… This... couldn't be...

'I've been looking for you,' Holtz said.

* * *

Doyle still sat in the driver's seat, Cordelia sat beside him. They were talking very quietly, worrying about what to do next. 'Are you sure you're OK?' Cordelia asked.

'I told you, this isn't about me, is it?' The Irishman replied.

'No. It's not. But that doesn't mean that you're OK.'

...

Gunn leaned against the passenger door and tried not to hear what they were saying. He had known there was something going on with Doyle, for months now - had known since he had met him at Dr. Gregson's clinic - and he knew Cordelia was in on the secret, but that Doyle wasn't telling anyone else what it was. Following the half demon's lead, Gunn had tried to put the whole thing out of his mind - it was none of his business what was up with Irish, if Irish didn't want him to know. But whatever was happening right now with Angel and Darla… that seemed to be affecting Doyle in a way it wasn't anyone else. And so Gunn was worried again. But it wasn't his business - so he tried not to hear. He wondered about going to join Wes and Fred round the back of the car.

The watcher sat on the trunk; Fred was standing a little way back, down the alley - anxiously peering around for any sign of Angel. Darla was left all alone in the back seat.

'I guess it's time to go, then,' Gunn heard Cordelia say.

'Yep, I guess it is,' the driver agreed. He raised his voice so everyone could hear, ' - everyone in - we're off.'

'Angel said five minutes,' the street fighter protested. But Cordelia informed him it had already been six and a half - they had to get going.

'Something must have gone wrong,' Doyle said, 'and in that case it's our duty to protect Darla .. and the baby. Captain Forehead can look after himself.'

'This is so typical of him,' the pregnant vampire complained, bitterly.

But Fred wasn't willing to leave yet. She twisted around in the alley, peering this way and that, scanning the rooftops for any sign of Angel returning. 'It probably wouldn't hurt to wait another minute, right?' she said, 'I mean what's the worst thing that could happen in another minute?'

Darla let out a blood curdling scream.

'Ask a stupid question…' Fred sighed to herself.

...

Wesley pushed himself off the trunk and went to examine the vampire, 'her water has broken,' he told the others, 'this is for real, there should be a blanket in the trunk.'

Gunn retrieved the blanket, and then he and Wesley helped manoeuvre Darla so that she was lying down on the back seat. Cordelia and Doyle watched from the front. 'What are we gonna do?' the woman asked, 'deliver it right here? ...I don't have towels, or hot water… or anything to cut the cord with!'

'Labour can take hours,' Wesley told her - moving away from Darla once he had got her comfortable. 'There is no need to panic, yet.' But his tone was more than a little frantic, as if he wasn't entirely certain of his words - and his lack of calm infected the others.

'What's keeping Angel?' Fred cried, again twisting around so she could see every corner of the alley way - but her search was as fruitless as before.

'OK, all hands on deck,' Cordelia said, getting out of the passenger seat and coming round to the back door.

Doyle, likewise, got out of his seat - and appeared beside his girlfriend, 'what do you want us to do?' he asked her, 'how can we help?'

She pushed her hair out of her face, as she thought. 'She can't give birth here,' she said, 'it's too exposed - we need somewhere safe and nearby.'

'Caritas?' Doyle asked.

'Exactly. Guys into the front seat - get us there as quickly as possible. Fred, get in the head side, time her contractions - have the pig's blood ready.' The other woman scurried into the car to follow the instructions. Cordelia climbed into the back seat as well, and took hold of Darla's hand. 'OK - we're gonna take you somewhere safe, Darla, don't worry… if you have a contraction you can squeeze my hand OK?' Then she looked up at her boyfriend, 'Doyle - drive.'


	33. Lullaby: Part One

Angel stared into the face of the vampire hunter, whom he had not seen for two hundred years. This man had been human… this could not be. 'Holtz,' he murmured, 'my god.'

'You have no god, demon.'

* * *

The car sputtered and died. Cordelia looked up from the back seat, in annoyance. 'Doyle? What's wrong? We need to get out of here!'

'Uhm - I'm just experiencing some … technical issues. I'll sort it.' He turned the keys in the ignition. It revved up - and then choked out again.

'Doyle!'

'OK OK, it's not my fault - alright? It's just… what with the hotwirin' … and now trying to turn it on properly, like, the poor girl doesn't know whether she's coming or going. It'll just take a minute.' He began to fiddle with the wires again.

Darla let out an agonising scream. 'That isn't helpin' me concentrate,' Doyle muttered. His girlfriend leaned over and smacked him in the back of the head.

'Ow - what was that for?'

'For making this about you! Darla's in trouble.' She turned back to the pregnant vampire, 'it's OK, sweetie. The idiot will get us going in no time - and then we'll find you a nice comfy bed.' She squeezed her hand. Darla let out another moan.

Fred glanced at her watch. 'The contractions are coming closer together,' she said, 'she's moving into the active stage of labour.'

'I'm goin' as fast as I can,' Doyle muttered - still trying to spark the wires off each other.

* * *

'The Tro-clon,' Angel realised, 'the prophecy, raised up from darkness to bring darkness - that's you. Holtz, whatever brought you here…'

His voice was cut off, when he was seized roughly. Grapplar demons grabbed hold of his wrist and neck, using metal clamps at the end of long sticks. And once he was held fast, the old vampire hunter stepped towards him. 'You did,' he told the vampire. 'You and your demon bitch. For two hundred years I slept. For two hundred years I dreamed of nothing...' He raised his sword and laid it against Angel's throat, Angel tried to pull back from it - but he was held in place by the demons' iron grips. '... but this moment.' He pulled his sword back, 'you haven't changed.'

'Actually, I have,' the vampire corrected him. 'Whilst you slept - a lot changed.'

'Really?' He did not sound convinced. He threw holy water into Angel's face - and, as it touched him, the vampire's face changed to that of the demon. Holtz smirked. 'Somehow things seem the same to me.' He placed his sword at Angel's throat once more. 'I _will_ have justice.'

But Angel disagreed - there was no justice for the things he had done to the vampire hunter. There was nothing that could make his actions right - or bring back what was lost. There was no suffering in the world that could balance the scales - and Angel knew it...

...

_Holtz rode through the countryside - his heart pounding with each footfall of his horse… Angelus and Darla were at his home. He had left his family unprotected in order to hunt the vampires down - and they had gone straight to where they could hurt him the most. If anything happened to Caroline…_

_He burst into the house - and there she was - on the parlour floor. Her eyes were blank and staring. Twin puncture wounds marked her neck. He dropped to the ground and cradled her body in his arms, beginning to weep - begging her forgiveness._

' _Papa? Papa?' A little voice fluted through the still house._

_He raised his head, and turned around - and felt his heart expand in relief and gratitude. 'Sarah!' he gently lowered Caroline back to the floor and flung himself on his daughter. The tears stung his eyes and his breath came out in ragged gasps of relief._

' _Mama won't wake,' the little girl told him._

_He picked her up, and held her to his heart, 'hush now,' he told her - and began to sing her a lullaby. He carried her across the room; then he sat on the window seat and cradled her in his arms. All was not lost. He had not lost everything. The demons had not got his beloved dau… as he pushed the hair away from her face, to soothe her, he noticed the two puncture marks on the side of her neck - identical to her mother's. And he felt the icy weight of dread lodge into his heart, once more._

_One of his men entered the house, 'Captain?'_

_And Holtz looked up at him - almost crazed, 'get out of here!' he yelled, 'do not enter this house!'_

_The man saw Caroline lying dead on the floor. 'Dear god,' he breathed - and backed away to leave the man and his daughter alone to grieve._

_Left alone with his child, once more, Holtz resumed his lullaby..._

_..._

...Holtz didn't want to hear Angel's platitudes. He had suffered at the hands of this creature… God what he had suffered! And if the demon didn't think he could exact his justice, then it had no idea of just what tortures and cruelty Daniel Holtz was capable of. He had been a good man - once. Angelus and Darla had taken that from him - along with everything else - and now they would pay the price for that. He turned to the other Grapplars, 'go find the female,' he told them, 'if he is here, then Darla cannot be far. Or are you trying to tell me that has changed too?' he turned to ask Angel.

* * *

Darla continued to scream with pain. Gunn glanced over from the back seat, 'she's gonna pop right here,' he said, 'how's the car comin' along?' Doyle had since abandoned the driver's seat and had popped the hood. He was staring into it trying to find the problem. 'I think I got it…' he said, 'maybe.'

'I would feel better if we had the ancient scrolls to guide us,' Wesley frowned, also twisting in his seat to look at Darla.

Cordelia snorted, 'oh please - ancient prophecies are not gonna help deliver this baby. That's gonna happen no matter what. But I would feel a heck of a lot better if we had her safely stashed in the Host's bed at Caritas.' She raised her voice for the last bit, and aimed it at her boyfriend.

'I'm on it…' he called back. He slammed the hood down, and got back into the driver's seat. 'I think we can be off now.'

* * *

The three lawyers were sequestered in an office. No one knew they were there - no one knew what they were talking about. Secrecy was to be the key to survival. Linwood held a grainy still of Holtz - taken from the footage of Gavin's cameras, inside the hotel. 'We've no idea who he is,' Lilah informed her boss. 'We ran everything from the surveillance tapes through face and voice recognition and got nada. Whoever he is, he's not in the system.'

'A new player?' Linwood mused.

'Or an old one,' Gavin replied. 'He addressed Angel as "Angelus" - that suggests some personal history.'

'An old friend?'

Lilah shook her head, 'not likely, sir, Angelus didn't have friends.'

Linwood sighed, then asked after the current status on their surveillance. But it was still down - and nobody had heard from Commander Burke or Dr. Fetvanovitch. All they knew was that they had been successfully deployed inside the hotel - and then … nothing.

'Actually - that's all _you_ know,' Linwood told his two junior associates. ' _I_ , on the other hand, know nothing about this. It is clear that _I_ could never have been involved in such an ill conceived and, in the end, botched operation.'

'Because you were never here,' Gavin said.

'That is correct.'

'But we were?'

Linwood nodded. 'You were. I will expect a full report during Thursday's staff meeting - and be advised, when I first hear about this I will be both shocked and appalled.' He smiled at them, 'good night,' and he left the room.

Gavin stared at the door closing behind his boss, 'he's gonna crucify us,' he murmured.

But Lilah gave a dark laugh. 'They don't crucify here,' she told him - and he looked hopeful. 'Too Christian,' she finished. And Gavin looked despondent once again.

* * *

'OK, we're ready, everybody ready?' Doyle glanced around the car.

'Do we have a tire iron in the trunk?' Wesley asked.

Beside him, Gunn groaned, 'oh man - after all that you tellin' us we got a flat?'

'What about a hurling axe? Or some sort of heavy mallet?'

They all turned to look at what Wesley was looking at. The Grapplar demons melted out of the darkness, and advanced on the car.

* * *

Holtz admired one of the swords from Angel's weapons cabinet. Still held in place by the demons' iron clamps, Angel strained to see behind him - so he could scrutinise the vampire hunter. 'You're still human,' he said. He could smell that much, clear as day. 'How have you managed this?'

Holtz returned the sword to the cabinet - and spoke as if he hadn't heard Angel. 'She was always the trick, you know. Not you. Darla was the unpredictable one.' The number of times he had had the idiot boy in his grasp … just like today. It was the woman who always slipped away - who caused him all the trouble. Today was no victory - it was the same old same old - like the night in Marseilles, or that time in Rome. Today would be no victory until he held Darla as captive as Angelus now was. And therein lay the problem.

'Was it a demon?' Angel asked him, 'or something else?'

Again, Holtz didn't answer. He just continued his own conversation across the vampire. He pointed a stake at his heart. 'If I just … kill you now .. will she sense it?' he wondered. 'Would she then come running? Would that bring her bursting through those doors, I wonder?'

'Did something come to you - or did you seek it out?'

'She might show herself in the service of revenge,' Holtz mused, 'it can be a powerful motivator.'

'Yes it can,' Angel agreed, 'like you - what did you have to give up for this second chance?'

'Give up?' The vampire hunter sounded incredulous. 'I had nothing _to_ give up. You saw to that, Angelus.'

'We took a lot from you, it's true. But we didn't take everything. We couldn't take your soul.'

'What do you know of a soul?' His voice was bitter and disbelieving.

But Angel knew what he spoke of. He knew that Holtz' soul would be destroyed if he allowed himself to be used in the service of evil. That he was a good man - a righteous man - who was being used for some purpose other than justice. To protect his immortal soul, the vampire hunter must tread very carefully along this path he had taken.

Holtz looked at Angel - as if seeing him in a whole new light. 'Can it be that you really _have_ changed?' he wondered. 'I don't remember you ever pleading so cravenly before.'

Angel glanced at the demons that held him, 'and I seem to remember that you used to work with men.'

His words struck home - and Holtz slapped him across the face.

* * *

Lilah left the office and drove towards the hotel, fuming. She was going to have to sort this out, herself. Gavin was such a rookie. He had big ideas but no experience of damage limitation. How much trouble could you ever get into in real estate? She was going to find out who the pirate was. She was going to find Darla. She was going to sort it. Gavin hadn't even thought to leave the office. Well, she'd save her own ass and then hang him out to dry - the little creep.

* * *

The front doors opened and a Grapplar entered. Ever so polite, Holtz excused himself from the vampire he was interrogating and went to speak with his minion. They had a hurried, muttered conference and then the vampire hunter smiled. 'Excellent, bring her in.'

But the woman the demons brought forward was not Darla. He frowned - and threw some holy water in her face. Lilah blinked and looked annoyed, but her face did not vamp out. 'She isn't even a vampire,' Holtz was disgusted at their failure.

'I'm an attorney,' Lilah told him. She looked over at where Angel was standing, still held in place by the vicious looking pincers. She looked back at Holtz. 'Look - if I'd known you were torturing him, I wouldn't have interrupted. Please continue, I'll wait until you finish.'

'When I'm finished he will be dead.'

'Oh.'

But the vampire hunter was now interested in this woman, who dealt in man's laws and was sanguine in the face of torture. 'Do you know what he is?' he gestured to Angel.

She nodded. Of course she knew. Vampire - cursed by gypsies - who restored his soul - destined to atone for centuries of evil - wacky sidekicks - yada yada. 'I'd have him killed myself,' she said, 'only the people I work for have this,' she made air quotes with her fingers, 'policy.'

Holtz turned back to Angel, 'what does she mean - cursed by gypsies?'

'Long story, Holtz, wouldn't interest you.' Angel had noticed something. A hand grenade lay on the floor, next to a dead commando - and he thought he might _just_ be able to reach it.

Lilah turned to leave and Holtz stopped her. He couldn't allow her to leave this place. She frowned and began to argue. Whilst they were both distracted, Angel craned his neck to eye up the elevator, behind him - and then put the tip of his toe onto the grenade. 'Lilah,' he said.

'What?'

'Duck.'

He flipped the grenade upwards and caught the pin in his teeth. Shaking his head, he forced the bomb free from its pin. It fell to the floor and then - a moment later - exploded. The blast blew Angel backwards and knocked Holtz off his feet. As the vampire hunter picked himself up, he noticed the man shaped hole in the elevator doors. He went to inspect it - and peered down the empty shaft. He looked back at his minions, 'search the grounds!' he commanded.

* * *

The car was still dead - and so the team tumbled back out to face the oncoming Grapplars. 'What's this? Another wacky cult that wants to worship Angel's kid?' Gunn asked.

'Looks like,' Doyle replied, 'everybody ready?' He morphed into his spikes. Beside him, Cordelia took on the stance that Angel had taught her for the beginning of a fight.

'Wouldn't be saying no to that tire iron right about now,' Fred said, looking at how outnumbered they were.

'Wouldn't be sayin' no to some help from the lady vampire right about now,' Gunn added, glancing back at Darla, who had remained in the car. She appeared to be talking to herself.

'Weapons in the trunk?' Cordelia asked. Doyle popped it, and grabbed what was there, there was only a sword and a bat. He handed them to the women. 'Here - take these - we're on our own, boys.'

'We gotta keep more weapons in there in future,' the street fighter groaned.

The Grapplars charged, and the team took on a defensive position. 'Keep them moving!' Wesley called out.

'Don't let them get behind you!' Gunn added.

The five of them leapt into the fray.

* * *

'Those men you sent to kill Angelus,' Holtz said to Lilah, 'they fought bravely.'

'Oh - good.'

'They fought to the last.'

She smirked, as she looked downwards at their slaughtered corpses. 'Yeah - I get that.'

'But send more and I will do the same,' he warned, 'no one can have him but me.'

'Actually - they weren't sent to kill Angel,' the lawyer told him - more's the pity, but there was that company "policy". 'This was meant to be a party for his girlfriend.'

Holtz was interested at once - this woman knew of Darla? Had she too been ensouled by gypsies?

'No - Darla's free range evil, but hey - if you manage to catch up with her, maybe we can do some business.'

'The only business I have with Darla is to send her back to the hell she came from.'

Lilah opened her mouth to answer, but the short man stalked away - leaving her alone amidst the remains of the massacre. She shrugged - whatever. Then she took out her cell phone and rang one of her contacts. 'Harvey? It's Lilah - I've got a job for you. Angel Investigations.' She leaned against the counter, as she spoke - and as she did, she noticed the remains of what appeared to be an ancient scroll just lying there. She picked it up and looked at it. 'Yeah - full cleaner service,' she said into the phone, turning the scroll so she could look at it from another angle. 'Thanks.' She glanced around, and saw some memo pads with Wesley's scribblings on them. Scooping up the whole lot - along with the ancient prophecy - she left the hotel and headed back to the office.

* * *

Darla still sat in the back seat, chatting away and gesticulating wildly to herself. Cordelia ducked under the arm of one of her assailants, and then pulled it back - getting him into a hammerlock. She forced his hand as high up his back as it would go, putting added pressure on his elbow and shoulders. The demon squealed out in pain. She dropped him to the floor, and then stabbed him, whilst he was still squirming on the ground. Then she turned to where Doyle was trading blows with a much larger demon than he. 'Doyle!' she threw him the sword and he caught it and ran his opponent through.

He returned to her side, 'you OK?'

'Yeah - is it me or is Darla acting…'

Doyle glanced at the vampire, 'crazy? Maybe it's her hormones - duck.' Cordelia hit the floor and the half demon slashed the sword through the air, beheading another Grapplar.

Darla continued to chatter away to herself. She shook her head and then slid behind the wheel.

'Charles!' Fred was overpowered by the demon bearing down on her. Gunn jumped onto its back and broke its neck. It fell to the floor with a thump. 'Thanks,' Fred said, and then swung her bat directly at the street fighter's face. Like Cordelia - he hit the ground in an instant - and Fred hit the Grapplar demon behind him full in the snout with all her might. It staggered backward, and Gunn scrambled back to his feet and launched himself at the demon.

As the fight raged on, Darla turned the keys in the ignition. Whatever Doyle had done under the hood must have worked - because it roared into life. She put the car in gear and mowed down the two Grapplars stood in front of her. Then she put it in reverse and, with a squeal of tyres, drove the car backwards - taking out all the remaining, fighting Grapplars. A change of gear, again, and she zoomed forward once more - driving the car down the alleyway and disappearing around the corner...

...Her would be defenders all stood still - fists and weapons still raised - and stared after her, rather lamely. There was a moment of complete quiet as they just gazed after the disappeared vampire, mouths slightly open. Then. there was a slight noise - and a slightly singed Angel dropped down beside them. He, too, gazed down the alleyway, intently. 'What are we looking at?' he asked.


	34. Lullaby: Part Two

'Holtz?' Wesley asked. His voice was disbelieving - but Angel nodded. The watcher attempted to clarify, 'the vampire hunter who tracked you and Darla through…'

'The late seventeen hundreds? - Yeah.'

Doyle whistled, 'well as timin' goes… this has gotta suck. How did he get here?'

'He didn't say.'

'Y' sure he's human?'

'I got a pretty good nose for that sort of thing.'

Doyle whistled again. But Gunn was thinking that maybe there could be another explanation. A more logical one. 'You're sure it wasn't his great great … great _great_ grandson?' However, Angel had to shake his head - this was definitely him - the real deal.

Fred nodded her head slowly, as she processed this new information. It seemed to her that Holtz was probably another part of the puzzle - part of the coming events that would rain down ruination on mankind. After all - Wesley's translating skills had managed to decipher that the Tro-clon was not any one event but a confluence of circumstances. Cordelia was inclined to agree - the appearance of an eighteenth century vampire hunter in the twenty first century did seem …. Confluency.

'You think he's here for the baby?' Gunn asked. But Angel didn't think his old enemy even knew about it.

'He wouldn't have to,' Fred told them all, 'that's the entire beauty of cosmic convergence. He just plays his own small part.'

'Well - playing with his own small part aside - what does he want? If he isn't after your kid?' Doyle asked. Even in the dire circumstances, Cordelia snorted to herself at her boyfriend's words - and he smiled back at her.

'He says he's here for justice,' Angel said, 'but he isn't - there can be no justice. He's out for revenge. On me. And on Darla.'

'Then we need to find Darla before Holtz does,' Wesley said. 'Protecting the child - and preventing the confluence from occurring - must be our priority.'

'Can we prevent the confluence from occurring?' Fred asked, 'isn't that - sorta the point of fate? Holtz is here to kill Angel and Darla, now maybe he does that and the baby wasn't the destroyer - but some messianic figure sent to save us all - and his early death triggers the end of the world. On the other hand… Angel's kid _might_ be the destroyer - and in protecting it from Holtz we inadvertently bring about the end of the world? Isn't that sort of the moral of all those Greek tragedies - you can't second guess fate?'

'What happened to 'nothing's inevitable if you just look it in the face and say "your evitable"?' Gunn asked her.

She blushed, 'oh yeah - I guess maybe I was just overthinking it…'

'Better than underthinking,' Wesley smiled at her, then he turned back to Angel, 'so what about Darla?'

'I can find her a lot faster on my own,' the vampire told his friends, 'if you guys can just find somewhere safe… I'll bring her to you.'

'We were gonna take her to Caritas,' Doyle told him.

'Isn't that too close? We were gonna get out of town.'

'We _so_ don't have time to leave town,' Cordelia told the expectant father, 'Darla's waters have broken and her contractions are coming regularly. We need somewhere clean and indoors and where people won't try to kill us - in that order.'

'And your other old girlfriends were castin' the sanctuary spell last time we were there,' Doyle reminded him, 'makes it the safest place we know.'

'And it's close enough that a woman in extreme pain can reach it, before her hellspawn comes skittering out of her four hundred year old dead lady parts,' Cordelia finished up.

'OK - and ew! - I get it, I'll bring her to you there, OK?' Angel turned to leave - planning to scale the building and return to the rooftops as he tracked down his former lover.

'Angel?' Wesley called him back, 'I don't suppose … the scrolls?'

'No.' And then he was gone.

* * *

Lilah had brought in an expert from the transcribing department. He spent his days working with all the dusty prophecies Wolfram and Hart kept copies of, for their own nefarious purposes - she just hoped he would be able to work his own brand of magic on this latest finding. He examined it, holding it carefully in his latex gloved hand. 'Nyazian!' he exclaimed, 'exquisite! I recognise the Ga-shundi. Quite a find, have you any idea what this is worth?'

'Hopefully enough to save my hide,' Lilah told him. She handed him the memo pads filled with Wesley's scrawl, 'here, this should help speed things up a little. Now I've highlighted the sections that seem to be concentrating on…'

The translator looked horrified, 'you've _highlighted_ an ancient Nyazian scroll?' His voice was as aghast as his expression.

But Lilah had no time for his preciousness. She nodded her head, 'in yellow,' she clarified.

'Hmm.'

'So - can you translate it?'

He gave her a pitying look - when one was dealing with an ancient prophecy the best one could hope for was a loose interpretation - not a precise translation. The lawyer sighed… she wasn't splitting hairs, here - she just wanted the general gist. What did it say?

He nodded and took out his magnifying glass, scanning the ancient writings - specifically those highlighted... _yellow_. 'Uh - bring forth ...appear … born - uhuh… something about a birth.'

'What about a birth?' her voice was sharp.

'It's unclear.'

'Make it clear,' she snapped.

The expert settled himself into the chair, pulling the scroll closer towards him, and smiled. 'Well - this should be fun.'

'No. This shouldn't be fun.' Lilah's tone brooked no argument. 'What it should be is done by morning. Or I'll have your family killed.'

* * *

'You knew,' Holtz spat at Sahjahn, his tone was accusing. 'You knew and you did not tell me.' They were back in Sahjahn's lair, deep beneath the streets. Holtz felt more at home here - he preferred the flickering light of the torches to the harsh electric bulbs in the world above. But his comfort in his physical environment was not enough to soothe his anger at the demon, or assuage the problem he had now uncovered.

Sahjahn didn't understand, though. He shrugged his shoulders - trying to keep things low key. 'Okay! So I left out one teeny weeny little detail. It didn't seem that important.'

'Not important?' The vampire hunter could not believe what he was hearing - and struggled to choke his words out. 'Angelus with a soul?'

'It doesn't mean anything!'

'It means _everything_!'

The demon sighed - this is why he hadn't mentioned it! Because Holtz was turning it into a big deal, when it wasn't. So what if Angel had a soul? So did Attila the Hun. He was still a vampire - Angel that was, not Attila.

'But he's not the same vampire,' Holtz countered.

'Sure he is. His hair is shorter, spikier - he's using product. But it's the same guy.'

Holtz remained firm in his disagreement, however. Angelus had changed - he was different.

'Look,' Sahjahn said to him, 'I don't know what moral mind games you've been torturing yourself with, but you can't let this get in the way of what you swore to do.'

'Get in the way?'

'Isn't this what this is about? You find out Angel has a soul and now you wonder if things are maybe a little murkier - ethically speaking.'

But that was not the problem - no. Things had never been clearer. Releasing his soul to suffer for all eternity would only make his vengeance sweeter. Sahjahn was confused - if Holtz wasn't morally compromised by the thought of killing an ensouled creature - then why was he complaining?

'Because I have been hunting the wrong prey,' the vampire hunter said. 'I must know everything. Is there anything else you have kept from me?'

* * *

Darla stood high up on the rooftops, staring down at the sparkling city beneath. It was rotten - she could smell it. It was full of fear and lies and deceptions and hate. She rested her hands on her belly, and closed her eyes. Staying very still, she listened to the sounds of the life within her. She could hear the way it moved in her womb, she could hear the steady thump of its heart and she could hear its soul - it spoke to her, every fibre of her being picked up every message this tiny life sent out to her. Every fibre of her being wanted to respond to those messages - to give this child everything it needed.

But she couldn't.

When this child was born - she couldn't protect it from the world down there. She couldn't make things right, or take away its fear. Once this baby was born - she would become the very thing the child needed to be protected from. And that broke her unbeating heart.

* * *

'Do you think he'll find her?' Cordelia asked, as the team trudged their way through the streets towards Caritas. Her sword was attracting some funny looks - but there was no way she was relinquishing it. Fred, Gunn and Wesley were walking along in front of her - the three of them in a line, the tiny woman flanked by the two tall, imposing men. Cordelia was a few paces back, walking with Doyle - who had wrapped his arm around her in a way that kept her sword arm free.

'Ah - he'll find her. When does the big man not come through?'

She glanced up at him, and smiled, softly, 'I remember a time when he didn't come through for you - not that long ago. Not really.'

'This is different… this is … _important_.'

Cordelia didn't say anything - but she heard the bitterness in his final word. She decided to change the subject - for now - she didn't want him brooding over things that couldn't be changed. 'I think you ought to teach me how to hotwire cars,' she said brightly.

' _What?_ '

'Well - I was thinking - if you couldn't hotwire cars then we would have been dead in that alleyway with those vampires - Fred's Sweeny Todd act notwithstanding. And if you were ever not there for some reason… I just think: we can all take out a vampire or two; Angel's teaching me how to fight better but you have this really useful skill - and you're the only one that has it. It would be better - for the whole team - if more of us could do it, as well.'

'You know that part of my past isn't somethin' I'm proud of? It's not somethin' that I enjoy revisitin'.'

'Yeah - I get it, it was a dark time, for you,' she said to him, 'but - you have to agree - your petty criminal ways have left you with a nifty skillset. And I think it's time you passed them on.'

'I really don't wanna teach you how to be a petty criminal, Cordelia.'

'We can do a swap,' she promised, 'I'll teach you some first aid - so if someone gets injured and _I'm_ not there, you can help out. And you can teach me how to hotwire cars and pick locks - so if we need to do crime and _you're_ not there - I can help out.'

'Uhhhm…'

'At least say you' ll think about it?'

He relented, 'OK - I'll think about it.' She beamed her brilliant smile at him, and he smiled back at her, shaking his head slightly. They walked along quietly for a moment and then... 'And when he does find her?' she asked, going back to Angel, 'what then?'

'You begin your illustrious career as a midwife - you'll be great - y' know y' will.'

'And then what?'

He chuckled, darkly, 'I'm afraid my visions are not that specific, darlin' - I can't actually see the future. And the big guys are keepin' awful quiet on all this, anyway. Once the baby's born… we protect it… until it destroys the world and we cut its head off.'

'Well - at least you have a plan.'

'That's me - always thinkin' ahead.' They turned off the main road and walked along the street that led to the front entrance of Caritas.

* * *

Her eyes were still closed, but she sensed him. 'You always did like a view,' he said to her. She opened her eyes - and looked at her boy - and then back out across the shining sea of little lights.

'This world,' she sighed, 'this horrible world. Look at it. Why would anyone want to bring a baby into it?'

'To make it better, maybe?' Angel suggested.

'Or to destroy it finally.'

'I keep hearing that,' he said, 'but we don't know what this baby is. We don't know what their future is.'

But Darla knew one thing for sure, it didn't have a future - not with her. She couldn't have this baby, physically - she couldn't let it out of her.

Angel tried to reason with her - she didn't actually have much choice in that matter. But she shook her head. It was ready to be born - it was ready to come out - but she couldn't let it, she couldn't - because…

'You love it,' Angel stated.

And Darla nodded, the tears trailing down her cheeks. 'Completely,' she gasped. 'I love it completely. I-I don't think I've ever loved anything as much as this life that's inside of me.'

'Well - you've never _loved_ anything, Darla.'

He was right. She freely admitted he was right. Four hundred years and she had never felt this way before. Not until now - until this. But now she didn't know what to do.

'You'll do the only thing you can do,' Angel reasoned, 'you'll have it and then…'

'What? Raise it?' Her voice was a sneer, but a heartbroken one.

'Why not?'

She shook her head, he was being ridiculous. 'It's impossible. What do I have to offer a child - a _human_ child, except ugly death?' Her boy opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off, 'you know it's true.'

He tried to deny it anyway. What he knew was that she loved the child that she had been growing inside of her for nine months - bonding with it - nourishing it - giving it everything it needed.

'I haven't given it anything!' she cried, 'I'm dead. I haven't been nourishing it - it's been nourishing me. All these feelings are coming from it. I don't have a soul, but it does. That soul is inside of me right now, but - soon - it won't be. And then I won't even be able to remember that I loved it.' Her bottom lip wobbled, and her tears flowed faster. 'I want to remember,' she wept.

Angel pulled her close to him and held her against his chest. She cried for what she was going to lose - and he comforted her for her loss. 'Shh.'

'You won't let me hurt it, will you?' she said softly, 'you'll protect it - from me - I mean.'

'Yeah.' His sigh was very deep and sad, 'yeah.'

* * *

'She wants to have the baby here?' Lorne did not sound impressed with the plan.

'Well, I don't think she _wants_ to have it anywhere, bud, but nature _is_ gonna take its course - and your place has been volunteered… by us.'

'Well how very noble and self sacrificing of the lot of you,' the green demon replied, sarcastically. 'Can't you see I'm working my tush off?' He wasn't wrong - the club was once again swarming with contractors rebuilding after the massacre. 'I can't have a baby here - I've just had the booth simonized.'

'I'll set up in your bedroom - you won't realise we're there,' Cordy promised him, 'what do you want us to do - tell Angel and Darla they're not welcome?'

'No of course not - Caritas is a sanctuary and always will be. Or at least - it will if some people ever finish the work they promised to have done three days ago. How's that coming along there, Arnie?' he yelled at the demonic contractor, who was fiddling with wires.

'Balancing this interspecies flux - it's a little trickier than I expected,' Arnie said, straightening up.

Lorne snatched the instruction manual from him. 'That's not the only thing that's trickier than expected - you hum when you work,' he told Arnie.

'So?'

'So I read you, buster - which wire are you planning to leave unconnected so you can milk this job?'

'Are you questioning my work ethic?' bristled the work man.

'No - I'm firing you - get out - I'll do it myself.' He rolled his sleeves up and knelt down to look at the wires, 'wooee this looks complicated! Anyone know anything about wires?'

Everyone turned to look at Doyle. 'Fine,' the Irishman sighed, 'but I'm not promisin' anythin'!'

Wesley and Cordelia went into the bedroom to prepare for Darla's arrival. Doyle took his jacket off, took the instruction manual from the Host and then squatted down by the new security system and frowned. Lorne poured himself a sea breeze.

'How will we know if I've managed it?' Doyle asked, as he examined the wires and tried to match them up to the diagram.

'The system routes the new sanctuary spells to each other - preventing both human and demon violence,' the Host explained.

'Uhuh - well let's try this then ... Fred, be a peach and hit Gunn for me.'

The woman slapped the street fighter across the face. 'Ow! Damn girl!'

'Sorry, Charles,' she blushed, 'not working,' she said to Doyle.

The Irishman sighed and blew his cheeks out, as he thought, 'OK … I'll try somethin' different.'

* * *

'Darla,' Angel said after a long whole, 'we should get going, I feel a storm coming.' She pulled away from him, and hunched over. He looked at her, concerned, 'are you OK? Are you in pain? Was it another contraction?'

'No,' she gasped, fighting to straighten up, 'no, it was something else.'

* * *

Lilah came back into her office, where the translator was still working. 'You got something, yet?' she demanded.

'Yes, I believe I do,' he told her, 'whoever was looking at this before was getting very close,' he waved Wesley's memo pads, 'these have been enormously helpful. But I can see he ran into trouble right here - with the tense,' he pointed to the offending verb, 'Ga- shundi tenses are tricky little buggers. Ha ha!'

Lilah did not share his amusement, 'what does it say about the birth?'

'Well - that's the thing … it doesn't.'

The lawyer looked somewhere between alarmed and angry. 'But you said it did!' she accused.

'Yes I did.'

'But it doesn't?'

'In a way,' he smiled.

'I have a gun.'

That spurred him into dropping the cryptic. 'This isn't so much a birth announcement as an obituary,' he told her. 'The prophet is telling us there will be no birth.'

'Are you sure?' she could scarcely believe it, her breath stopped in her chest as she waited for his response. This could solve everything … she could come out on top for once … please, please - by all that was unholy - grant her a break.

'I'm quite sure,' the translator told her, and then he began to read: 'For surely in that time, when the skies open and the heavens weep, there will be no birth - only death.'

'Only death?'

'Just death,' he assured her.

'Just death,' she repeated, and began to smile.


	35. Lullaby: Part Three

_Holtz sat in his home, watching his daughter where she sat huddled in the shadows on the floor. He continued to sing the lullaby under his breath: 'sleep my love and peace attend thee. All through the night, guardian angels god will send you…' There was the sound of footsteps at the door and, looking up, the vampire hunter saw two of his men arrive._

_'Dear God,' one of the men breathed, staring down at Caroline where she lay - the baby dead beside her - 'this looks like the work of the devil himself.'_

' _Not the devil,' Holtz told him, 'just a demon.'_

' _What will we do?'_

' _Whatever it takes…' The sun was properly risen by now; its tendrils of light had crept across the property, bathing it in its warm rays. Little Sarah huddled further back - and Holtz got to his feet. He went to his daughter - his precious daughter - and picked her up in his firm grasp. She began to struggle as he carried her through the house. 'No, papa, no!'_

_He stepped outside, onto the veranda - headed for the edge. Her little fingers curled around one of the struts, clinging on - fighting to stay in the dark. 'Papa - no, please, Papa, don't!' But he ripped her grip free from the post, and then hurled her out onto the lawn - out into the glare of the sunshine._

_Her face changed, then - her lovely, cherubic, innocent face became ridged and fanged - the face of a demon from hell. The face of Angelus and Darla and all their evil ilk. And then she caught fire - and screamed as the flames consumed her. Holtz watched as his beloved child, his only daughter, turned into a pile of ash - and then blew away on the wind. Then he returned to the house once more - singing the lullaby beneath his breath._

* * *

Doyle continued to fiddle with the wires - this was beyond him, he thought. Sure, he could hotwire a car - but this was far more complicated - and involved meshing electricity with magic. He really didn't know a whole lot about magic - he didn't use it himself. This was way above his pay grade.

He looked up, as he heard the bedroom door open - and Cordelia and Wesley came back out into the club. 'We've done what we can,' Cordy said, 'now we just need him to get her here - can't deliver a baby if the momma's not here.'

'He'll get her here,' Doyle replied, frowning back down at the instruction manual, 'hey - Lorne, I really think you'd better look at this, as well. I got the electrics, but the mystical component? ...it's kickin' my ass.'

The anagogic demon crouched down to look at what the Irishman had achieved so far. 'Well no wonder - you big palooka!' he said, 'you gotta combine the essence of all species and channel them down into the circuit board.'

'Uh… I have exactly no idea what any of that means.'

'Here, let me…' and grumbling, Lorne nudged Doyle out of the way and began to fiddle. There were a few sparks. 'Ha!' the Host was triumphant, 'I'm convinced I've done it … someone check for me.'

Fred hit Gunn again, and once again she made contact with him - and delivered a stinging slap. 'Damn!'

'Sorry!'

Doyle smirked, 'it's not that easy is it? You big palooka!'

...

They all looked up, as they heard steps coming down the stairs - and a moment later, the two vampires appeared; Angel supporting Darla, practically holding her up, as they entered Caritas. 'Just a few more steps,' he was saying, 'that's it, OK. Alright.'

Cordelia pulled out a chair and helped Angel lower Darla into it. 'Thanks,' the pregnant vampire gasped.

'You're welcome… when you feel up to it, we'll get you into Lorne's bedroom - we've got everything ready for the birth,' Cordelia told her. 'How far apart are your contractions now?'

Darla gasped in pain, and Cordy gripped her hand - 'I guess they're pretty frequent, huh?'

But the vampire shook her head, 'that wasn't a contraction,' she told her unqualified midwife, 'it's … something… something bad is happening.'

Cordelia twisted her head, 'Fred, get over here!' the other woman joined their little group and, between them, they held a hushed conversation about what was happening - and what they should do about it.

Meanwhile - over head - there was the distant roar of thunder. The men all glanced upwards at the noise. 'Uh… as portents ushering in bad things to the universe go … I think thunder is probably one of them,' Doyle said. 'That sounded ominous to me.'

Angel glanced over at the huddle of women. 'Something's wrong,' he told the others, 'she's in a lot of pain.'

'The contractions?' Wesley asked.

But the vampire shook his head. 'She says she hasn't had one in a while - she says this pain is different. That it's something bad.'

'Something's wrong with the baby?' Gunn glanced over at Darla, as well, 'how can she be sure?'

'It's inside of her - she's connected to it - she can feel that... that…'

'It's dyin',' Doyle said softly. He looked up again, as a crash of thunder accompanied his words. And a moment later, Darla doubled over in pain and screamed out.

'Angel!' Cordelia cried, 'we need to move her - now.' In an instant, he was at his sire's side and had swept her into his arms. 'We're set up in Lorne's bedroom,' Cordy told him, and she led the way - as Angel carried Darla through the club and into Lorne's bedroom.

Fred, on her way to follow them, glanced down at the chair recently vacated by Darla. There was a puddle of blood on the seat. She looked up - and her eyes met Doyle's. He too had seen the blood, and understood its meaning. 'This baby has to be born, right away,' Fred said to him, 'otherwise…'

Doyle nodded at her words, but she couldn't help but notice that his normally expressive eyes seemed unusually blank.

* * *

'It's time to get to work,' Sahjahn told Holtz.

The vampire hunter looked up at him, 'you've found them?' He was furious that he had allowed Angelus to slip through his grasp… but then he had not known what manner of creature he was facing until it was too late. If the demons were found, now - he would not make the same mistakes twice.

Sahjahn ushered in a small, dirty looking man. 'Tell him.'

'You remember what we discussed?'

'Just tell him,' the demon snapped - and the eyes of the man suddenly went blank and lit up, and when he spoke his voice was not his own. 'What do you want us to do? Tell Angel and Darla that they're not welcome here?' Cordelia's voice rang out through the underground chamber. And when the demon spoke again, it was in the voice of the man who had just fired him - without paying. 'Of course not. Caritas is and always will be a sanctuary.'

Arnie's eyes went back to normal - and Holtz smiled, grimly, to himself.

* * *

Cordelia and Fred worked around Darla, checking her over. They tucked the blankets over the top of her - and then glanced back at the doorway, where the men stood watching. 'I just need to speak to Angel, honey,' Cordelia said to the vampire, stroking her blonde hair back, 'I'll be right outside, shout if you need anything.' The two women walked away and led the men out of the room. Darla pushed herself up to watch them go.

...

'How is she?' Angel asked.

'She's strong,' Cordelia told him, 'I think she can handle anything that gets thrown at her - physically.'

'Plus she's immortal,' Fred added, 'which is in her favour - healthwise.'

'But the baby?' the vampire asked. The two women looked at each other, their eyes were sad.

'It still has a heartbeat,' Cordelia told the father, 'but it's very faint - and growing fainter. If there is any chance of this baby being born alive - it has to be born sooner rather than later… but her contractions have stopped. It doesn't want to be born.' She reached out and gently laid a hand on Angel's face, caressing his cheek. He raised his head to look at her, 'I'm sorry, sweetie,' she whispered.

'Isn't there anything you can do?' He asked.

But it was Wesley that answered. 'Darla's body is not a life giving vessel,' he told the vampire, 'I don't believe she is equipped to do what must be done in order to bring a baby to term.'

'So - what, we just let my kid die?'

Gunn looked down at his feet and shuffled them, awkwardly. Doyle inhaled sharply and looked away. The rest of the group were still - and silent. 'If we could take her to a doctor,' Cordelia said, 'I'd suggest a c-section. But we can't do that here.'

'Why not?' Angel demanded.

'Angel - I can't slice a woman open and deliver a baby! A natural birth is one thing - sure - but I can't cut her up!'

'It wouldn't kill her!' Angel protested, 'she's a vampire - a knife to the belly is nothing - a flesh wound.'

'I can't…'

'You gotta try…' he stepped closer towards her, and Cordelia shuffled back - looking alarmed.

'Look, bud, if Cordy says she can't do it then she can't do it. We're not talking about forcing her into doing something she isn't comfortable or capable of doing.'

Angel whirled round, and faced down Doyle, then. 'No, we're _talking_ about my child dying - before it's even born. And that is not a conversation I am willing to have - if it was your baby would it be a conversation you'd take part in?' Doyle just inhaled sharply, again, and looked away, once more. 'I thought not,' Angel continued, 'no parent should have to see their child die. And we are going to do _whatever it takes_ to prevent that. This whole thing has been a miracle - well you don't just get half a miracle… we'll bring about the rest ourselves.'

'So - what, you gonna cut her open yourself?' Doyle asked him. There was no way he was letting Angel bully Cordelia into performing major surgery - she had a first aid certificate for god's sake - not an MD.

'I'll do it,' Wesley said, 'dissection of demons played a large part in the academy curriculum... I think I should be able to get it right first time.'

'You can't harm Darla either way,' Angel told him.

'No - but I might cut the baby in half,' Wesley said, 'Lorne - do you have a sharp knife?' Cordelia looked relieved, as this burden was taken from her shoulders - and Doyle gave the watcher a grateful smile. The Host went and found the sharpest blade in his establishment and handed it to Wesley.

* * *

Lilah sat in her office, thinking very carefully. This news seemed to be a stroke of luck that she would not have believed possible. But she had to think how to proceed, carefully. She now knew something that no one else did - not Linwood, not _Gavin_ , and not all the sects out there trying to get their hands on the vampire kid. The brat would never be born. The scrolls predicted its death.

There was another distant rumble of thunder … and she smiled to herself, as she watched the rain begin to pour. It never rained in L.A - especially not like this. This was … apocalyptic. She smiled, again. It was perfect, is what it was: _For surely in that time, when the skies open and the heavens weep; there will be no birth, only death._ The raindrops slid down the panes of glass, and she tracked each one of them. Angel's child would not live - it would be stillborn - tonight. And only she knew it. But she needed to think very carefully about when to tell Linwood the good news - and how to make sure that _Gavin_ took none of the credit. All this fuss was over nothing - and Lilah Morgan would live to fight another day.

* * *

Darla looked up, as the gang came back into the room. 'What is it?' she asked.

'Darla,' Wesley said to her, keeping his voice gentle, but firm, 'I do not wish to alarm you - but you are aware your pregnancy is in danger - and that we must take drastic measures in order to attempt to save it.'

'What are you saying?' she glanced at Angel.

He took her hand, 'it won't kill you,' he soothed, 'but it might save our baby - that's what you want isn't it?'

'It won't kill me?' she asked, she laughed a dry, throaty chuckle, 'what? Are you planning on cutting the baby out of me?' Then she saw their faces… 'oh.'

'Like I said - you'll be fine - you'll heal - and we'll take care of you.'

'It won't work,' she told them, 'you think if it were that simple, I wouldn't have cut it out of me as soon as I realised it was there? You think I didn't already try?' The gang all glanced at each other in disquiet. 'Something's protecting it,' she said.

'Something may have been protecting it,' Wesley countered, 'but circumstances have changed - this baby has been healthy all this time. Now it is dying…. A c-section is worth a shot.'

'Fine,' she sighed and rolled up her top, exposing her belly. The gang all glanced at each other again. 'Wouldn't you like a painkiller? Or something to bite down on?' Cordelia asked her.

But the pregnant vampire shook her head. 'Just do it - just get this over with.'

They all watched, with bated breath, as Wesley sat down beside her and ran his hands across her bump. She also watched him, keeping her dark eyes fixed on him as he scrutinised her - looking for the exact right place to make his cut. 'I believe … this should do it,' he raised his knife and laid it against her skin, and then looked her in the eyes, 'ready?' She nodded. He pressed down with the blade and, as he did so, a sudden green light emanated from the place between Darla and the knife - like a force field - and Wesley was thrown backwards across the room. He crashed into the wall and slumped to the floor - unconscious. Darla sighed, 'I told you something was protecting it,' she said.

* * *

The rest of the gang were back out in the main part of the club - and only Angel was left with Darla now. The two parents left alone to grieve the loss of their child. 'The baby's stopped moving,' she said to her boy, 'it's been months - and finally they've stopped kicking.'

'Maybe they figure they've got your attention.'

She shook her head. 'I can feel the life slipping away from me.'

'Then don't let it,' he gripped her hand, 'you have to fight this - please.'

She smiled - a sad and tired smile, 'my boy,' she said, 'my darling boy… I told you I didn't have anything to offer this kid. Some mother… can't even give it life.' There were tears in her eyes, as she spoke, and they were mirrored by Angel's own.

* * *

When Cordelia had finished patching up Wesley and got him back on his feet, she went over to where Doyle was sitting on one of the tables. She perched on next to him and wrapped her arms around him from behind, resting her chin on his shoulder. 'Hey,' he said to her, without turning.

'Hey you,' she replied, 'this is… poor Angel.'

'Yeah.'

'I guess it kinda puts things in perspective, huh?' she said to him. 'Sure we have our own problems … but, at least we'll never have to go through this.'

He sighed, heavily, 'yeah.'

...

Lorne was back fiddling with the wires, trying to bind the spiritual to the physical. 'OK - this time I got it. Try now.'

'Nuhuh,' Gunn said, 'hit Wes this time.'

'I just got knocked unconscious - hit Gunn!'

Fred looked apologetic, 'sorry, Charles,' and smacked him around the back of the head. But this time, instead of making contact, her arm hit a blue barrier of light - and she was knocked off balance.

'Hey! I did it!' Lorne looked delighted, everyone else just stared back at him, 'yay me?' he said, and then tutted when they failed to respond. 'Well - OK then - everyone's drinking - and I'm buying.' He got to his feet.

Fred glanced back at the bedroom door, 'I wonder what they're talking about in there?'

'What can you say in a situation like this?' Wesley asked.

Fred shrugged. 'I don't get it. The Powers have got her this far - they've looked after the baby for nine months. Why are they letting this happen now?'

'Maybe this is The Powers finally stepping in,' Gunn suggested, everyone turned to look at him. 'I mean… I hope everything's OK - and I don't want Angel's kid to be the destroyer … but what if it is? And this is The Powers stepping in to make everything alright?'

'Charles!'

'I'm sorry - OK? I am - but, if The Powers wanted this kid to be born - we wouldn't be going through this… and wouldn't they have sent Irish a message telling us what to do?'

Doyle frowned, 'I guess they did send me a message,' he said. Everyone's head turned to look at him, 'beyond the one about Darla goin' to the arcade, I mean. That night - the night after my trial. The night of Angel's epiphany. I had a vision - of Angel and Darla - y'know...' He twisted his mouth up, conveying what he had seen through his expression.

'Making hellspawn?' Gunn finished. Doyle nodded. 'See - I told you,' the street fighter said. 'The Powers sent Doyle a vision so he could prevent it from happening. When he didn't get there in time… they had to bide their time until they could put things right.'

'I guess that's a theory,' the Irishman agreed, looking thoughtful.

'I don't know,' Cordelia said, 'Angel doesn't deserve this. He's on The Powers' team … I can't see why they would hurt him this way.'

'Some things are just bigger than that, though, Darlin'.' Doyle glanced over his shoulder so he could look at her, 'I guess maybe… hurtin' Angel is the better option; that - whatever else might happen - it might hurt him less in the long run to hurt him now.'

'It's about doing what is right,' Wesley agreed, 'not what is easy - the two are rarely compatible. Hurting Angel to prevent something worse from happening in the long run is an act of mercy. The Powers may be doing him a kindness … it doesn't mean they get any joy from their actions.'

The whole team looked glum. 'Well, gee,' Lorne said, 'I guess I can't pour these drinks fast enough!' He walked behind the bar, and then looked up - as a short man in a long coat walked through the door. 'Hello,' he said pleasantly.

The man looked the green demon up and down, 'hello.'

'We're not open at the moment,' the Host said, still smiling. He handed the man a flyer. 'Why don't you come back tomorrow for our grand reopening?'

The man looked down at the flyer, 'thanks,' he said - and turned to walk out of the bar. As he gained the stairs, he began to sing his lullaby. ' _Sleep my love and peace attend thee. All through the night, guardian angels god will send you.'_

Lorne looked up, his eyes widened in terrified, horrified realisation. The bottle and glass dropped from his hand. The others looked up at him. 'Run!' he gasped.

'What's going on?' Cordelia frowned.

'Run - just run!' and he ducked out from behind the bar and began to race his way to the back of the club. The others scrambled to their feet and followed him - infected by his sense of panic.

...

Outside of the club, Holtz dropped his barrel down the stairs. He watched it roll down and then clear the metal detectors. The electronic frame beeped as the canister passed through it. And then he threw in a grenade. It too bounced down the steps and then came to a rest next to the barrel. A beat later, the grenade exploded - and a fireball tore through Caritas, destroying everything in its wake.


	36. Lullaby: Part Four

Angel lay on the bed beside Darla, holding her in his arms - when the others, headed up by Lorne, came bursting through the door. 'What's going on?' the vampire asked. He was annoyed - these quiet moments with Darla were important, they needed this time… and here his friends were, butting in. But his annoyance became alarm when Wesley, gasping for breath after his sprint, informed him they were being attacked.

'Attacked?' he turned an accusatory stare on the anagogic green demon, 'I thought you had double protection sanctorium spells?'

'I do!' Lorne protested, 'it's a thing with the door, and the stairs and the world and the thing. Never mind!'

'Apparently, you can be outside and shove stuff in,' Gunn said.

Lorne looked even more annoyed, 'I just said that!'

'I guess maybe we couldda done with knowin' that before we decided to keep the pregnant vampire and her miracle child in L.A,' Doyle said.

'Hey - I'm not the one that invited you in here - I never suggested you use Caritas as your maternity ward!' The Host defended himself.

'Guys… now's really not the ti…' but Cordelia was cut off by a burning beam crashing through the ceiling and landing beside the two vampires. Darla screamed, Cordelia flinched - and Doyle pulled his girlfriend further away from the burning strut, trying to shield her with his body.

'It's Holtz,' Angel realised.

'You reckon?' Doyle's voice was sarcastic.

But Darla was looking confused. Ignoring the half demon, she honed in on Angel's words, 'what?' she asked, her voice drenched in disbelief. That name… she hadn't heard of that name … thought of that name in over 200 years. One minute the vampire hunter was chasing her and her boy across the entire western world, never slowing - always finding them; no matter how hard they tried to shake him. Implacable. Unstoppable. And then - he had simply vanished off the face of the earth… and for over a hundred years, she and Angelus were free to roam the world at will - without a care; causing destruction; cutting a bloody swath through continents and leaving devastation in their wake.

How could that name belong here and now? In this moment of death? 'How is this possible?' she asked.

'We need to move the bed,' Lorne said, glancing backwards towards the door - out to his club, where the fire still raged; threatening to reach them. Angel helped Darla off the bed and the others all shoved it to the side. Darla still stared into Angel's face, 'what do you mean?' she asked.

'He's here,' her boy replied. 'I would have mentioned it before, but I didn't think it was the right time.'

'No,' she sank into a chair, her face expressing her desperation and defeat. Her voice was quiet - thoughtful. 'No, it's the perfect time.'

...

'What's behind the bed?' Gunn asked, as they dragged it away from the wall.

'An old loading dock door,' Lorne told him, 'I had the whole place converted.' He had told them before how he had built Caritas on the very spot he first landed on this earth. When he had first arrived from Pylea, this building had been an old, abandoned warehouse - and he had built his temple to music on that very spot, as thanks for his deliverance.

'What's on the other side?' Wesley asked.

'An alley.'

'A blind alley?' Cordelia checked, 'because he might be chasing us there on purpose.'

'No no - it's open both ends, he can't block us in.'

'As long as he's alone,' Fred pointed out.

'Wait - y'think maybe those demons we fought by the car were sent by him?' the Irishman asked her.

'I think we got a lot of people attacking us right now,' Fred replied. 'We need to be cautious.' They all stopped and stared at each other. And then another burning beam fell through the ceiling and crashed onto the floor.

Wesley shook his head, 'demons we can fight - whatever's out there, doesn't matter. Getting out of here is all that counts - we need to break through the plaster and get out of this door.'

...

'The things we did to him,' Darla said softly. She stared into the blaze created by the burning beams, her eyes glazed over as her mind took her back two centuries. It had all been a game to them, back then. They had nothing to fear - except death - and they had delighted in baiting the vampire hunter, in goading him… so much so that they overplayed their hand - and made his vendetta personal. And none of it had mattered. Without a soul - it had just been a game. And when he was gone - she had forgotten all about him, and what she had done to him. Until now… and now, this tiny life - which slipped from her moment by moment - allowed her to feel the shade of the horror she had caused. She looked up at her boy, tears in her eyes, 'Angel!'

'I know,' he replied, his face grim.

...

'You got a hammer, or an axe?' Gunn asked - looking at the wall that stood between them and freedom.

'Buddha head,' Wesley replied, holding the ornament up and handing it across to the street fighter.

'A rhino,' Cordelia offered. Picking up a heavy ornamental, rhinoceros and handing it to Wesley. The watcher used the horn end to start bashing against the wall, trying to break through to the door, and Gunn did likewise with the ornamental head.

'Doyle, here!' Fred picked up a hefty statue of an Indian Elephant and threw it at the half demon. He caught it, morphed into his spikes for extra strength, and then joined the other men battering down the wall. The two women hung back, out of the way. Getting through that wall, quick enough to escape the flames, would require a brute strength that they simply could not supply. But, as the three men worked away, it seemed like even they may not be enough to allow them to escape.

...

'That's why this is happening,' Darla whispered. She was back to staring at the flames - realising that the time had come when she would have to pay for all the evil she had done. But the price of her evil was the life of her child. Karmic, in the face of all she had done to Holtz - and to countless others over the centuries, but so unfair for the tiny unborn child inside of her. 'His family,' she gasped. She placed a hand on her belly, 'his children. What must that have been like for him?' She glanced back up at Angel, 'doesn't seem so funny now, does it?'

'Darla?'

...

The smoke in the room grew thicker, and the living members of the group were forced to pull their sweaters over their noses and mouths in order to keep breathing. 'We're not gonna make it,' Doyle yelled, keeping his own face protected with the left sleeve of his leather jacket.

'Angel, we could use some vampire strength, here!' Wesley yelled over his shoulder. Cordelia and Fred took the vampire's place, next to Darla, and Angel joined the men at the wall. Morphing into vamp face, he began to punch at the wall with his bare fist - pounding away until brick dust and plaster flew through the already smoke thickened air. Wes, Gunn and Doyle all fell back, to give him more room and - using his fists and feet - Angel crashed through the wall to the doorway beneath.

* * *

Holtz entered the club and walked slowly through the wreckage. Fires still blazed all around him, and the debris caused by the destruction of the grenade littered the floor. But he noted, there were no human - or demon - remains. Those that chose to help and protect Angelus, his enemies by virtue of their allegiance to the creature of the night, must have survived. He was able to find a path through to the back of Caritas, and he headed towards Lorne's bedroom door.

* * *

The alley was quiet, deserted, and lit by Chinese lanterns. There was the distant sound of talk radio coming from inside one of the other buildings along the street. But other than that - nothing. It was completely still save for the relentless, driving rain which battered the ground. The utter stillness was suddenly broken - when the blocked up wooden loading door - at the back of Caritas - suddenly exploded outwards. Shards of wood flew through the air and scattered onto the ground. And then the team stumbled through the hole - Cordelia and Doyle leading the way, followed by the rest - and finally Angel, supporting Darla, finished out the group.

They began to head towards the end of the alley, moving towards the car. But Darla, even half carried by her boy as she was, could not go any further. She was weak and exhausted - and she could not take another step. She collapsed against him and he tried to pick her up completely, but she protested and let herself sink to the soaking floor. 'No, No,' she said. Everyone came to a halt. 'Go on,' she told them, 'I can't. It doesn't matter anyway.'

'I'm not leaving you,' Angel told her, kneeling down beside her. The rain continued to fall on them, soaking them all to the skin and slicking their hair against their heads. The vampire fished in his pocket and took out his keys. 'Here,' he threw them at Wesley, 'go get my car, it's out front.'

The team turned to leave but, after a few steps, Fred stopped and turned to look back. 'C'mon Fred,' Doyle said as he passed her, 'we need to … leave them to it.' But Fred looked unsure and that made Cordelia glance back, as well. Darla was lying on the ground now - even though it was so wet - and Angel was beside her, gripping her hand.

'Go on Fred,' She said, 'go get in the car - I'll go to him.' She disentangled herself from her boyfriend's arm and hurried back down the alleyway.

'Cordelia!' Doyle called after her, but she didn't turn back to look.

Fred and Doyle glanced at each other, 'go with Wes,' he told her, 'I'll…' he trailed off and stayed where he was, staring back at where Cordelia was approaching the two vampires. Fred nodded - and followed after Gunn and Wesley and Lorne.

Cordelia knelt beside Angel, he glanced at her. 'What are you doing?' he asked, 'go with the others.'

'I'm not leaving you,' Cordelia said, softly, she glanced down at Darla, 'or her.' Angel looked like he was going to argue and then, after a moment, he took off his coat and slung it around Cordelia's shoulders. She pulled it over her head, to protect herself from the rain and - from the distance that Doyle watched her at - it gave her the air of someone playing the Virgin Mary in a nativity scene. Although it was Darla who carried the miracle child …

'You're gonna be OK,' Angel said to his sire.

But she shook her head - no, she really didn't think she was going to be. 'Once my baby is gone,' she gasped, 'I won't be OK. I won't be OK at all - I don't know what I'll be.'

Angel was crying - and so was she - but their tears mingled with the raindrops, indistinguishable - their grief simply running down the road and swirling into the gutters. 'Angel - our baby is gonna die right here in this alley.' She suddenly gripped his hand tighter, and looked into his face, 'you died in an alley, remember?'

'I remember,' he kissed her hand.

'I want to say I'm sorry,' she told him, 'I wanna say it - and mean it. But I can't.' He said nothing, 'aren't you gonna tell me it's gonna be OK?' she asked.

'No.'

'No - It's really not, is it? We did so many terrible things together. So much destruction - so much pain. We can't make up for any of it. You know that, don't you?'

Beside him, Cordelia inhaled sharply at Darla's words and Angel glanced at her, and then looked back at his sire. 'Yeah,' he replied, after a long moment. And Cordelia hung her head, closing her eyes, as she realised Angel believed his mission was hopeless.

'This child,' Darla said, 'this child is the one good thing we ever did together.' Angel raised her hand to his lips again. 'The only good thing,' she told him. He buried his head against his hand and her own, resting his forehead on the place where they were joined. He squeezed his eyes closed, to try and contain his grief - and so did not notice her spare hand creep across the sodden floor. Her fingers closed around one of the splinters of wood that had blown out of the door. 'You make sure you tell them that,' she said to her boy - before driving her makeshift stake deep into her heart.

He felt her hand collapse beneath his and looked up - to see the last of his sire disintegrate to dust. Where Darla had been, a tiny, naked infant lay on the wet floor - crying.

* * *

Holtz stepped into Lorne's bedroom - his crossbow raised - and looked around.

* * *

Doyle watched from a distance, as Angel carefully gathered up his tiny, living child - and held it close to his chest. The half demon's heart hammered thunderously inside his own chest, as he witnessed the impossible happen. A child - born of two vampires - born alive, and human. Angel was a father now. To a human child. That could not be - could never be… and yet… The universe would always conspire to create miracles for Angel - because he was a champion, a warrior - the laws that governed the dimension itself would break themselves for him. A lowly messenger could never hope for such similar treatment. The impossible would always be impossible for him. He could never have what Angel had right now.

* * *

Holtz stepped through the hole in the wall - out into the alleyway. The vampire was there, his back turned - and the man pointed his crossbow at him.

* * *

Angel and Cordelia slowly got to their feet. Still at a distance - Doyle watched, as his girlfriend removed the coat that had been protecting her and handed it back to Angel; who wrapped his newborn child up in it. Once more, Doyle was forcibly reminded of a scene from the nativity. Of the father, holding the newborn miracle child. Turned away from the inn, that was meant to bring safety and shelter - the babe was swaddled in anything his parents could find to protect him.

Darla - the real mother - was dead now. Her ashes washing away in the river of rain that swept down the streets - as if she had never been there at all. And now all that was left was Angel, and his child … and Cordelia. The three of them stood in the pouring rain, a little family huddled together for shelter. And Doyle stood watching them - alone.

...

Slowly, Angel turned around, sensing someone behind him. Holtz stared at him over the top of his crossbow. For a long moment, they both just looked at each other. Then a Grapplar demon joined his leader - helping to block the exit. Behind them, the car pulled up - and Wesley got out.

Angel and Holtz still stared at each other - and then, slowly, the vampire hunter lowered his crossbow.

And, after a moment, Angel - still clutching his child to his chest - began to walk towards the car. Cordelia clutched his arm, as they passed the demons - but the demons stood back and let them go.

...

Further down the alley - Doyle watched the little family leave together, headed for the safety of the car… and then he turned, himself, and walked out of the alley the other way - choosing not to rejoin his friends.

...

Holtz also watched the little trio leave. Sahjahn appeared beside him. 'Do it!' he urged, 'now's your chance! Do it! Finish it whilst you still can. You can't just let him walk away! Not now! Not after what you swore to me.'

Holtz watched as the vampire, his woman, and his child reached the car and got in. 'I swore that I would show no mercy,' he told Sahjahn. The car drove away. 'And I won't.'


	37. Dad: Part One

Doyle walked through the streets of L.A, the rain continued to lash down on him - and he wrapped his leather jacket around himself tighter, to try and keep as much of himself dry as possible. He remembered the way Angel had wrapped his own coat around Cordelia, during the birth - and how Cordelia had taken it off to wrap around the baby once it was born. And how the three of them stood together like a little family - Angel holding the one thing he should never be able to have - Cordelia looking at the one thing Doyle would never be able to give her.

The Irishman stopped at the crosswalk and waited for the light. He wasn't exactly sure where he was. But across the road he could see the neon, flickering sign of a liquor store. He shrugged, internally. He could stop off there and ask for directions, and pick something up that would make him feel better - two birds, one stone.

The man appeared on the light - and then the countdown began. Doyle hurried across, dashed over the slippy sidewalk, and then pulled open the door to the bottle shop. He shook the rain off himself, like a dog, when he got inside.

'Nasty night out there,' the man behind the counter said, 'not had a lot of customers this evening - most folks don't wanna come out in this weather.'

'Me neither, bud - but I ended up out anyway. Figured I might as well treat myself.' He picked up a bottle of scotch and took it to the till.

'You ever seen a night like this before?' the guy asked him.

'I grew up in Ireland - this is pretty much what my summer holidays looked like.'

'Well, I aint never seen a night like this. It aint natural in L.A,' the man squinted his eyes and peered through the window across the store, 'feels - I dunno - like something bad is about to happen.'

'Yeah,' agreed Doyle, 'I've been hearin' that a lot, lately. Listen - you know the way back to North Hollywood from here?'

The guy behind the counter gave him directions - and Doyle nodded his thanks. He picked up his bottle of liquor, unscrewing the cap whilst he was still inside, and then headed back out into the rain. He kept his scotch in the brown paper bag - although that began to disintegrate under the onslaught of the weather - and drank straight out of the bottle, as he continued his lonely trek back to the hotel.

* * *

The rest of the team arrived back at the Hyperion - having stopped off at an all night mall to buy some emergency supplies for the baby. Cordelia burst through the door first, 'Doyle?' she called out into the deserted lobby, 'are you here?' But only her own voice echoed back to her, and she turned and looked at her friends entering behind her, 'he isn't back yet - I hope he's OK. Why didn't he get in the car?'

'He stayed behind in the alley,' Fred told her - though she had already told Cordelia this a number of times on their journey home, 'I thought he went back to … you guys.' She looked towards Angel, who was still cradling his new child in his arms, not looking at anything else.

'I hope he's OK,' Cordelia fretted, again, then she shook her head as if to clear her thoughts and focused on the more pressing problem at hand. 'In the meantime - we need to sort this hotel out - baby proof it…' she glanced around and saw the blood stained equipment and two cages, which were all that was left of the massacre that had taken place earlier in the evening, '...right after we gut it and do a complete remodel,' she finished up.

Fred looked alarmed at the sight of the cages, 'we need to be careful,' she said, 'whatever was in there might still be loose.' Then she saw that they were labelled: Mother, and Baby. 'Oh,' she said, sounding horrified.

'There's blood over here,' Gunn announced - also looking around the mess in the lobby.

Wesley was investigating too, 'not to mention some bastard's blown a gaping hole in the lift.'

Angel finally glanced up from the baby, 'sorry. My bastard,' he said to the watcher.

'Oh… well… it's not like we ever used it.'

There was the sound, then, of footsteps approaching the doorway. Angel immediately huddled protectively around the baby, holding it closer to his chest. Gunn hefted his axe, ready for a fight - and Wesley aimed his crossbow. Cordelia, however raced up the steps to the door and pulled it open, 'Doyle?' she asked. But then her face fell.

Lorne stepped through the doorway and lowered his umbrella, shaking the rain out. He looked around at the weapons and grim faces that met him. 'Now is that anyway to welcome a house guest?' he asked.

Everyone relaxed and lowered their weapons. 'House guest?' Gunn repeated.

'Well, I figured that since you all managed to destroy my club - twice - that I wouldn't be imposing if I hit you up for a place to stay.' The he stepped towards Angel with his arms outstretched. 'Ah, come on, hand over the little nipper, let Uncle Lorne have a gander.' Angel held the child even tighter and twisted slightly away from the green demon. The Host turned and stared at the rest of them, wondering what was going on. 'I'm sure everyone else has had their turn.'

But the team all shook their heads, 'we're still waiting for our turn,' Cordelia informed him, 'hey, Lorne… you didn't see Doyle anywhere around the club did you? He's... missing.'

But Lorne was still trying to get a closer look at the baby, he reached out and touched Angel's arm, and the vampire flinched back as if scalded. The demon looked surprised, 'wow - I'm sensing some serious mama bear vibes,' he said, then he looked at Cordelia, 'what's that honey, you lost your prince?'

She nodded.

'Well - he wasn't there when I went back for my few remaining possessions,' he indicated his one suitcase. 'He must have walked home.'

'In this weather?' As if to emphasise her point - there was a loud clap of thunder, and the rain beat even harder against the window panes.

'Yeah - it certainly is apocalyptic out there aint it?' the Host smiled, 'and talking of apocalyptic… I see the the wee bairn has got a scratch on his cheek.' He suddenly frowned, 'his, hers? What kind did you get Angel?'

But the vampire didn't answer, he just kept staring down at his baby - and keeping everyone else away from it.

'It's a boy,' Cordelia told Lorne, then she spoke to the new father, 'here, let me put some ointment on his scratch.' She came over, with the bottle of ointment in her hand.

But Angel wouldn't let her get close and took the bottle from her - and then laid his son down on the counter top. Gently holding him still, he freed his tiny arms out from under the blanket, and then dabbed the ointment onto his son's cheek. The baby boy began to cry, and the new father looked panicked. 'What did I do?' he asked the others.

'It just stings is all,' Cordelia said, peering down at the baby, 'you did fine.' Then she walked away and sat down on the stairs that led up from the lobby to the courtyard door. She peered out of the window and then looked back at her friends. 'Doyle is gonna catch pneumonia if he's walking home in this,' she sighed. 'Just what we need - two babies to take care of around here…' she glanced up at where Angel was still fussing over his son, 'and then there's the brand new kid, as well.' She wrapped her arms around her knees and then rested her chin on them - and looked glum.

Gunn and Fred were peeling the labels of the cages. Job done, the street fighter picked up a big metal cleaver that lay on top of the big cage. He gave it a disgusted look, 'I don't even wanna know,' he said.

'You think you could throw it?' Fred asked.

'Yeah, why?'

'There!' She pointed through the glass doors leading to the courtyard, where a demon had jumped the railings and was charging for the hotel. Cordelia got to her feet, with a scream, and fled deeper into the lobby for safety, just as it barged inside. Gunn lobbed the cleaver and, with an agonised roar, the demon fell backwards. The cleaver was buried in its chest - and one of Wesley's crossbow bolts was shot into its neck. Angel picked up his baby and turned his back, to protect his son from the violence.

'This isn't over, is it?' Cordelia asked, looking down at the fresh corpse on their floor.

'No,' Wesley told her. 'Angel's son is part of the prophecy. Everything and everyone will be coming for him.'

'Which means we need a plan,' Gunn said.

'Aha!' Angel's voice cut through the conversation, sounding triumphant, and everyone turned to look at him. 'I figured it out,' he told them. They looked at him, expectantly, but were surprised when he stuck his hand into his coat pocket and pulled out a diaper. 'He wet himself,' the vampire said cheerfully, 'he needs changing.'

* * *

Soaked to the skin; his legs aching from walking so far and more than a little unsteady on his feet because of the alcohol, Doyle arrived outside the hotel. He let himself in through the courtyard gate. The lights were on in the lobby and he could see everyone inside. Obviously, tonight was too big a night for them to just turn in and go to sleep - even after the ordeal they had all been through. But that meant he couldn't just sneak in unnoticed.

He also couldn't just walk in there clutching a half drunk bottle of scotch in a rain sodden paper bag. He needed somewhere to hide it. There were jasmine bushes blooming near the fountain, and he stuck the liquor under one of them, pushing it as far back as he could. He'd come back for it later. Then, straightening up, he took a deep breath and walked in through the garden doors - concentrating with all his might to walk in a straight line.

...

'There you are!' Cordelia's voice sounded halfway between relieved and annoyed.

'Here I am,' he agreed, he nodded to Wes and Gunn and then headed over to his girlfriend.

'Well, where have you been?' she asked, 'you're soaking!'

'Well, it's rainin' pretty heavy out there, darlin'!' he tried to give a roguish smile, flashing his dimple at her to try and make it seem like his walkabout act was no big deal.

'But how come you didn't get in the car?' Now she knew he was definitely safe - there was a lot more annoyance and a lot less relief in her voice.

'I got … separated,' he told her. He had thought up a cover story on the way home - an innocent explanation for why he had taken himself off and walked home alone - for miles - in the middle of a thunderstorm, which was potentially part of an apocalypse. 'I didn't want to leave you in the alleyway,' he told Cordelia, 'so I got split up from the others, but when you and Angel walked out past Holtz and those big ugly demons?... I didn't really fancy tryin' doin' that by myself, so I turned around and hotfooted it out the other side of the alley… and then I got lost.'

She nodded, accepting his explanation as a fair one, and wrapped her arms around him, 'you are hopeless,' she told him, smiling, 'but I'm glad you're home safe.' Then she pulled away from him, looking suspicious. 'Have you been drinking?'

'No.' He looked around the lobby, 'so where is… where's Angel?' He swallowed, hard, 'and … um… the baby?'

* * *

Angel finished fastening the diaper. This was harder than it used to be. Not that he had changed a diaper since his sister, Kathy, was born over 250 years ago, but he had used to know what to do. When nappies were the proper sort - with pins. These newfangled ones, though, with the fasteners?... This was just another case of the modern world making things more difficult for no good reason - like cellular phones.

'There we go, baby,' he said, 'we're done here, ready?' he picked up his son, and wrapped the blanket around him once more. Then he carried him back out to the others. 'Hey - Doyle, you're back,' he said, sounding pleased.

'Yeah,'

'Good - I need you to get on the computer and start researching creatures, demons, minions of hell that might have it in for my kid. Now.'

'Um, OK…' the half demon ducked under the counter and went to his desk, firing up the computer.

'The rest of us, we need to make an enemies list - who do we already know about?'

Gunn went to get the whiteboard they sometimes used as a case board and set it up. Wesley took a pen and drew a vertical line down the middle of it. 'We should split it into two columns,' he explained to the others, 'those groups and individuals that we know pose a threat; like Holtz, Wolfram and Hart, and that vampire cult that attacked us earlier.' He wrote those names up. 'The other column should be those that _might_ pose a threat.'

'Like who?' Angel demanded.

'Maybe The Scourge?' Cordelia suggested, 'they're big into purity of blood - might not be too happy with the idea of a vampire kid knocking around.'

Over by his computer, Doyle gulped, 'man I hope those guys don't come back,' he said.

'They give you the wiggins?' Cordelia asked him.

'Well - they were supposed to kill me that one time so .. yeah… y' could say that.' He looked back at his screen, 'I got just about as much as I can handle goin' on right now, without my own premature death raisin' its ugly head, again,' he muttered to himself. Something flashed up on the database he was searching. 'Oh, here's a couple o' other names for the maybe list,' he called, 'some guys called "The Order of Phillius", and a friendly soundin' fella who goes by the name of "Beltar the Cremator".'

Wesley dutifully wrote those names down. 'And I seem to recall from my time at the academy that there was one demon in particular who specialised in child sacrifice - particularly where the child in question was special or gifted in some way; young seers, shamans… even potential slayers if it could get its claws on them. We watchers always had to be very careful to protect our young charges… though of course not all potential slayers were found.'

Cordelia rolled her eyes, and came up next to him at the board, 'and does this demon have a name?' she asked, 'or are you just gonna bore us to death with tales of your glory days from the watchers academy, failing to find slayers?'

'The piper beast,' Wesley said, writing it down.

Cordelia snorted, 'lame.'

'Yes, well - it's modus operandi suggests that Angel's child could be right up its alley.'

'So it's on the list,' Angel said, 'anything else?'

'There's always Frank,' Gunn said.

'Frank?' the vampire whirled around to look at him, frowning.

'Local mobster,' the street fighter told him, 'specialises in kidnapping.'

'Write him up,' Angel commanded. Then the baby began to cry. Over by the computer, Doyle flinched, and then redoubled his concentration on the screen - trying to blot out the noise. The vampire stared down at the wailing infant, in his arms. 'What is it?' he asked, 'you can't need changing - I just did that. Are you hungry? I got you a bottle ready.' He looked up at his friends, 'where's the bottle?' Cordelia left the whiteboard and ran to get it, bringing it over to the new father. He snatched it out of her hand, and she sighed and held her hands up in surrender, leaving him to it.

But he couldn't get the baby to drink, it just continued to cry and cry. 'OK,' Angel said, trying to keep his voice soft and soothing, 'here's your baba,' he coaxed, 'here's your baba.' Gunn began to smile. 'You just take it like this,' Angel said to his son, raising the bottle and pretending to drink, 'and you drink and you're happy.'

But the baby was having none of it. It continued to wail.

'Here,' Gunn said, coming over to his friend, 'why don't you let me take him for a while? I helped raise my cousin since she was about a week old.'

But Angel pulled away from him, just as he had done from Lorne and Cordelia. 'No - I got it,' he said. He walked away, so he and the child were alone in a space together. 'OK, so we got a list,' he said to the team, 'now all we have to do is erase everyone on it.'

'I can do that,' Fred said happily, picking up the eraser and starting to rub out all the names.

'Ah - Fred,' Cordelia said.

The other woman stopped and looked at her - and then realised. 'Oh - you mean erase as in squish them… I'll just put those names back on.' She began to write Holtz's name back onto the board.

Angel walked up and down, jigging the baby in his arms. 'You want to drink this?' he asked, 'yes you do - it's a nice baba - just drink it… please?'

Doyle continued to try and block all the sounds of the baby from his mind.

* * *

Holtz returned to the underground lair. He was followed by Sahjahn and the Grapplar demons, the latter of whom had stopped off at the dumpster behind a fast food joint and were busy devouring their finds. Sahjahn was not pleased with the events of the evening. 'Well that was thrilling,' he complained, 'it's not like I've waited 2 centuries for you to take your blood vengeance on Angel just so you could stand there and let him go.'

'Why didn't you tell me Darla was pregnant?' the vampire hunter asked quietly. There was a dangerous tone to his voice - he had already made clear his upset at being kept in the dark about Angelus' soul and he had _specifically_ asked if there was any other information he needed to know.

Sahjahn did not heed the tone, however. Incorporeal in this dimension, he had nothing to fear from the wrath of the vampire hunter. 'Didn't matter,' he said, 'you were _supposed_ to kill them both before she could have it.'

'She sacrificed herself to save the child.' Such things should not be known - should not be possible. Vampires were demons of hell, self sacrifice was not a part of their makeup.

'Yeah, Darla did your job for you,' the demon sounded pissed off, 'but at least one of them is dust.'

'She got off easy. Angelus' demise will be a great deal more painful.'

But Sahjahn was unconvinced. Holtz kept throwing around these big words; 'death', 'pain', 'no mercy'. But the demon wasn't seeing any of it. There didn't have to be a deep dark master plan in all this. Holtz just had to walk up to Angel and stake him in the heart - poof - easy!

'Step one is getting rid of these minions,' Holtz said - looking over at the Grapplars, who still gorged themselves on their greasy finds.

'No - step one is poof,' Sahjahn argued, 'there are no more steps.' Besides - they couldn't get rid of the Grapplars. He had signed a two week contract - and they weren't the type of creature that you welched on.

'They are soulless beasts,' Holtz said, 'bred only to maim and kill.'

One of the Grapplars stopped eating and began to look at the fast food containers in its hand. Holtz and Sahjahn paid it no attention. 'Ah - maim and kill,' Sahjah said, 'two more words I like. You're gonna need these guys - unless your plan is to kill Angel with candy clowns and marshmallow pies.'

The Graplars began to choke, and the demon turned to stare at them, 'what's happening to them?' he asked.

'I need more than mere fighters,' Holtz told him.

'They're choking! Do you know the Heimlich? I can't do it in this dimension - my arms'll go straight through.' He became suspicious, as the vampire hunter did not share his increasing panic. 'What did you do?' he asked.

'I poisoned their drink.'

'Why?'

'Because I don't need mercenaries willing to kill for anyone who will pay their price. I need warriors who will die for my cause.' As the Grapplars gasped their last, the vampire hunter indicated the computer, 'we can find information using this box - correct?'

'What do you want to find?'

'Obituaries.'

* * *

'You know - you should go shower and change,' Cordelia said to Doyle, 'if we're gonna be up all night, you shouldn't be sat around in wet clothes.'

'You sound like my mom,' he replied, 'anyway…' He glanced over at where Angel was still pacing up and down with the baby, 'I don't think we're allowed to take personal breaks right now. Besides - look at this.'

He nodded to the screen, and Cordelia inhaled sharply as she saw what he was looking at. 'Oh - the world is a sick and demented place,' she said.

'What's up?' Angel asked looking over at them.

'There's already three websites offering money for the baby,' Cordelia told him.

'Then trace them,' Angel said, 'Doyle - find them - now.'

'I'm on it.' He sneezed, his face briefly turning green and spiky.

Cordelia glanced at him, he was shivering. 'Nuhuh,' she said, 'Angel, Doyle needs to get into some dry clothes before he gets sick.'

'I think Doyle has some slightly more pressing things at hand than a change in wardrobe, right now, Cordelia, don't you?' The new father snapped.

But Cordy stood her ground. 'Fred can help trace the websites - Doyle, go - hot shower, dry clothes - now.'

The Irishman looked between the vampire and his girlfriend, and then got to his feet. Angel snorted in derision as the half demon passed by. Doyle stopped in his tracks and looked at the man cradling the newborn child - but then decided against saying anything, and went up the stairs.

Fred went to join Cordy at the computer. Angel was still trying to get the baby to take the bottle. He picked up the teddy, waved it in his son's face and then pretended to feed the bear, 'see, teddy likes the bottle,' he said. The baby continued to cry. 'I like it too,' the vampire shook a few drops of milk into his mouth and smiled, before twisting his head away and grimacing.

There was a sudden blue flash throughout the hotel. 'What was that?' Fred asked, looking up.

Lorne came back down the stairs, at that moment. The flash had been the furies putting up a force field over the hotel. Nothing could get in or out. They were safe - as was the baby - for now. But it wouldn't stay safe for long. Plenty of those that were seeking the child would have the power to bring down the force field - and those that didn't could always throw a grenade in.

'It's OK,' Lorne told them, 'I had the furies install an emergency exit down in the sewers. It opens and closes with a safe word. The Pylean word for hedgehog.'

Fred began to giggle. Cordelia looked at her, 'I'm guessing it means something different here?' she said, dryly. 'Anyway - we'll have to use it, the baby needs to see a doctor.'

Angel looked panicked, 'why - he isn't sick,' he tilted the baby so the others could see him, 'does he look sick to you?'

'No,' Cordelia said gently, 'but he needs his newborn checkup.' She picked up the baby book they had bought at the all night bookstore. 'This says he's supposed to have a vitamin K shot, and a PKU test, after he's born. Uh-' she suddenly looked querying, 'are you gonna circumcise?'

The baby began to scream even louder.

'I think he heard you,' Gunn said.

'Speaking of hearing things,' Lorne said, looking up at the ceiling, 'are there fluorescent lights in here? I keep hearing this hum.' But the team shook their heads - no fluorescent lights in the hotel.

Angel began to look through his weapons cabinet. He called Gunn over and they had a brief discussion about the fire power the vampire was going to need. Protecting the baby was going to take way more than swords and spears - he wanted bigger and more destructive. Gunn promised to get right on it. Then the vampire turned back to Fred, 'any luck with the websites?'

'Not yet. Normally all we'd have to do is hack their email and track their relays. But they're using remailers.'

'Which means?'

'Which means there's no direct id,' Cordelia translated for him. 'It's gonna take a little time.'

'We don't have a little time. Dammit! I need Doyle down here working on this, this minute.'

'Even Doyle wouldn't be getting there any quicker,' the Irishman's girlfriend assured Angel.

'Well - I would like to test that theory, but no! Doyle has to walk home in the rain and then take time off, from protecting _my kid,_ to get changed.'

'He can't help you if he gets sick,' Cordelia said, staring at the vampire with an injured expression on her face.

'Well, right now he isn't _helping_ at all.' He looked at Wesley, 'are those all the names up there on the board?'

'I'm working on some other leads,' the British man told him. He looked at the frantic vampire, and tried to make him see reason. 'We all want the same thing, Angel,' he said, 'we're doing the best we can.'

But it wasn't enough, 'Do better!' Angel demanded.

'Angel!'

'I promised his mother,' Angel told the team, 'that no one is gonna put their hands on this child. No one.' He turned around, still cradling the baby, and stormed up the stairs.


	38. Dad: Part Two

Back at the Wolfram and Hart offices, the three lawyers watched him go upstairs on their monitor. 'Now, I thought according to our translators, the Nyazian scrolls said this child was not going to be born?' Linwood said, 'and yet here it is.'

'It was a technicality, sir,' Gavin explained, 'Darla died during childbirth.'

'Dusted during childbirth, more like,' Lilah corrected. 'According to our sources, she staked herself; leaving the baby alive and kicking - but never actually born. Macduff was from his mother's womb untimely ripped.'

Linwood picked up a picture of Holtz. 'Moving on,' he said, 'I want everything there is on this character. He slaughtered some of our best trained men. He's gonna be a problem.'

'We're locating him sir,' Lilah promised.

'Preferably before he locates us.' The senior lawyer moved closer to the monitor - and looked at the baby on the screen. 'That's one cute little fella,' he said - and chuckled, 'yeah you are,' he said to the baby, 'and your daddy is a vampire with a soul. Who sometimes reverts to a creature of pure malevolent evil who would rip your tiny throat out, yes he does.'

He chuckled again, 'I like kids,' he said to his two juniors. 'The Senior Partners took mine before I really got a chance to know them.' On the monitor, the baby began to cry. 'Turn it down,' Linwood said, and then left the room. Lilah turned down the volume, and watched her boss leave.

* * *

Doyle had dried off and dressed, and now he was towelling his hair. He felt better for showering and changing - warmer. The cold from the rain had been seeping into his bones - and he had begun to get chills, sitting at that computer. But Cordelia's timely intervention had hopefully fixed things… and he appreciated that, even in this madness, she was still thinking about him. His well being still mattered to her - even now there was a baby to protect. Though that hadn't made Angel happy...

He finished rubbing his hair and placed the towel back in the bathroom - thinking. When Cordy had accepted that the woman killer demon - Billy - had had no effect on Angel, but had still insisted that Doyle run away in case he get infected, Doyle had been mad with jealousy and hurt. And - knowing how he was now in direct competition with Angel for Cordelia's love - he had vowed to himself that he would make every effort to be every bit as noble and self sacrificing as the vampire was, and get rid of any anger and hatred he carried around inside of himself - to ensure that he really was the one who deserved Cordelia. And he had made steps towards that … he had gone to Lilah and made his peace with her, and he made every effort not to interfere with Angel training Cordy - and act like the jealous boyfriend. He trusted Cordy - so he kept himself away and let her got on with her new thing. And he had even tried to let go of the anger he still felt towards Angel for the way the vampire had let him down and abandoned him this time last year.

But now he had been presented with an even greater hurdle. Just as he struggled with himself to come to terms with his own infertility - and with the idea that he could never be a father - that Cordelia would never be a mother, if she stuck with him… his very infertile vampire friend only went and had himself a baby. And now the hotel would be full of the sounds and smells of infant children - a constant reminder of everything Doyle would never be able to have. And so far … well he had to be honest with himself, he hadn't handled it too well. He'd got into fights with Angel, he'd wandered off and left Cordelia worrying, he'd gotten _drunk_. He was failing to be as good as Angel, falling short of his own self imposed goal.

So it was time to get back on the right path. Grit his teeth, square his shoulders and just be happy for his friend. And help protect the child. There were enough bad things out in the world, waiting to harm this new born baby, without it having an enemy lurking here in the hotel, as well. It was time to offer an olive branch to Angel - and then get down to whatever task he was given in the fight to protect the vampire's son.

As he came out onto the hallway, he saw Angel climbing the stairs up to his own apartment on the higher floor. Deciding to talk to him right now, Doyle followed him up the stairs. He walked in through the door just as Angel put the baby down in its cradle.

'Teddy isn't crying,' the vampire said, waving the teddy at the baby, 'Do you see teddy cry? Teddy isn't crying. Do you see teddy crying? No, teddy isn't crying.' The baby continued to cry - and Angel rested his head against the crib and sighed.

'Hey, Angel, man…'

'Why aren't you downstairs working on tracking those websites that wanna buy my kid?' Angel demanded, without turning around.

'I just came to…'

'I don't care. What I care about is minions from hell not buying and selling my baby like he's a two dollar yo yo from a toy store. Get downstairs - and do your job.'

There was a moment of silence and then - 'fine.' And Doyle turned on his heel and walked away. He bumped into Lorne on the way back down, 'you see if you can get through to him,' the Irish man said, ''cause I'm done tryin'.'

* * *

Inside his room, Angel was making one last ditch attempt to stop the baby from crying. ' _Toora loora loora toora loora lay,'_ he sang. ' _Toora loora loora that's an Irish lullaby.'_ But the crying did not even slow.

Lorne came into the room, and smiled at the sight of the defeated vampire. 'Here, let me give it a go,' he said, ' _ooh ooh baby baby ooh ooh baby baby. Mistakes I know I made a few, but I'm only human. You'll make mistakes too. And I'm crying…'_ He stopped singing, as the baby continued to cry. 'He doesn't like Smokey Robinson and the Miracles? I thought you said this kid had a soul?'

Angel leaned over the cradle, and began to talk to his son - his voice had a pleading, desperate note to it. The baby was fed, he was changed, if the vampire held him - he cried, if he put him down - he cried. What did the baby want him to do? The baby cried even harder, and Angel turned to look at Lorne. 'I'm a terrible father!' he picked his son back up, 'I can't even get him to stop crying.'

'Yeah, well - it's getting a little tense. Your vibe, that is.'

'My vibe? What vibe?'

'Oh just the incredibly anxious one that's been coming off you in waves ever since he was born. He's deeply connected to you. If you're wound up this tight - how do you think he's gonna feel?'

'Hey!' the vampire protested, 'he's less than a day old and he's already got an enemies list. How would you feel? Wouldn't you be a little edgy?'

'Yeah - I'd also be in awe. Look at him.'

Angel looked down at the screaming baby in his arms.

'He's more than just a mission, bro,' Lorne said. 'Look at him, _look_ at him.' And he turned and left the room, as the vampire continued to stare down at his son. A smile began to slowly play on Angel's face, turning the corners of his mouth up ever so slightly the longer he looked at the baby. He sat down in a chair and gazed deep into the scrunched up, red, little face of this tiny life that was so utterly dependent on him. 'It's alright,' he soothed, 'it's all gonna be alright.' The baby continued to scream.

'Shh,' hushed Angel. He pulled a silly face and made some noises, 'you like that?' but the baby continued to scream. He tried another - pulling his ears out, and making his cheeks fat - but the baby continued to scream. 'OK, kid, I only got one more in me.' He shook his head, and morphed into vamp face. The baby stopped screaming, at once, and gurgled with delight. A huge grin spread across Angel's face, exposing his fangs. 'That's my little guy!' he said, 'you like that, don't you? A bootchie wootchie woo.'

* * *

Lilah walked down into the basement where files and records were kept. She gave her clearance to the woman behind the desk. The woman checked it and then asked how she could help.

'I want everything the firm has on Angel,' the lawyer said, 'the whole case file. His life history, his un-life history, intercept records, victim lists, transfers and accounts, everything. I'm looking for someone he crossed paths with probably a hundred years ago or more. And make it fast. The guys upstairs are at, like, defcon - a thousand.'

'Sure thing, Ms. Morgan,' the woman smiled, 'just a sec'. She reached behind her and took a massively thick ring binder down from the shelf. It thumped down on the desk with a loud thud.

Lilah struggled to pick it up. 'Is everything in here?' she asked.

'Everything down to the baby that wasn't supposed to be born.'

'How do you know about that?'

'I'm files and records - it's my job.'

'Excellent,' Lilah said, 'I'll have this back when I'm …' she began to walk off.

'Ah - Ms. Morgan?' the woman called her back. Lilah turned. 'There aren't any documents in there,' the woman nodded at the folder in the lawyers' arms. 'That's just the reference key to the full file.'

Lilah glanced down at the ring binder, 'the reference key? So where is the full file?'

The woman flicked a switch and a whole section of filing cabinets was illuminated. Lilah stared at them. 'That _whole_ thing is Angel's file?'

'Just the first 35 cabinets.'

'Right,' she dropped the folder down on the floor, and sat beside it. 'Does China Palace deliver down here?'

* * *

'Hey, Fred, why don't you go up and get some rest, darlin'?' I'll take over trackin' down those websites.' Doyle had arrived back in the lobby, and went straight over to his desk, where the young woman was working.

She glanced up at him, 'um - I'm not sure we're supposed to be sleeping tonight,' she said.

He shrugged, 'Angel's upstairs - what's he gonna know? We can't all of us stay awake for the next … god knows how long. We're gonna have to work in shifts. Go up to bed. Cordelia'll wake you when we're too tired to keep goin' anymore.'

After a moment, Fred nodded - and made her way to the staircase. Cordelia brought Doyle some coffee. 'Thanks,' he said, sitting down in front of the computer and looking at how far Fred had got. He took a sip, 'trackin' these IP addresses is gonna take a lot o' time,' he said.

'Yeah, ixnay on the imetay when Angel's around. He wants this done asap… he has no idea how any of this works.'

'Well - as long he's upstairs, we don't have to worry about him. But there's no point lyin' to him, it'll take as long as it takes… which might be forever. This could be impossible.'

He found where Fred was up to, and then continued trying to hack into the anonymous service provider. 'Hey, darlin' y'know what might be quicker?' he said to Cordelia, 'whilst I'm tryin' to hack - why don't you leave a message on the website? Use a remailer of your own so they don't realise it's comin' from the hotel… pretend you think you can get them the baby, see if you can get 'em to respond. They might give us some info we can work with - at least a meeting point, then we all turn up and kill em.'

'Great idea.' She sat at her own desk and switched on her own computer. She connected to the internet and began to look up how to use an anonymous proxy server. Having found the information she started to follow the steps that would allow her to hide her IP address.

She drank her coffee, as she worked, and a hush descended over the lobby - save for the tapping of the keyboards until - 'it's a boy, isn't it?' Doyle suddenly asked, 'Angel's baby… Is a son?'

Cordelia looked up, 'uh - yeah, yeah, Darla had a baby boy.'

'Does he have a name yet?'

'If he does - Angel hasn't told anyone… same as he hasn't let anyone touch him.'

Doyle nodded, and was silent for a moment. Then - 'I don't know why, but when I pictured kids of my own - I always imagined them to be little girls.'

'That's the last thing you need,' Cordelia smiled, 'more women wrapping you around their little finger.'

Doyle smiled, as well, 'maybe that's why I wanted 'em,' he suggested. 'I can't get enough of you bossin' me around.' They both looked each for a moment - the smiles of what might have been reflecting back at each other. But then their happy expressions faded, and Doyle sighed, 'I guess it doesn't matter, anyway,' he said.

'I guess not,' Cordelia said, softly. They turned away from each other, and went back to work. They worked steadily for the next few hours, and then - as the first tinges of dawn crept across the courtyard - Cordelia went to wake Fred, and the young couple went to bed.

* * *

Holtz stood behind a chain link fence, watching a dark building across the way. A door opened and a young woman came out, lighting a cigarette as she went. The vampire hunter looked at the piece of paper in his hand. It was an obituary from 6 months ago - a woman named Julia Cooper had been killed; a mugging gone wrong, so the report claimed. He looked back up at the young woman in front of him - she was identical to the woman in the picture. He followed her.

As he rounded a corner, he noticed a barely smoked cigarette dropped on the ground - and raised his hand, as the woman swung her fist at him. 'Your punch would have been quicker, without so much to drink,' he said to her.

'Yeah well it's a trade off,' she said, 'without the alcohol this…' she headbutted Holtz in the face, 'hurts a lot more.'

He threw her away from himself, 'you stick to the shadows,' he noted.

'I'm not much of a day person,' she picked up a 2x4 that lay on the ground.

Holtz saw her do it, 'I'm not here to fight.'

'Too bad.'

She swung at him, again, but he easily evaded her - and then pinned her to the wall, his hand gripped around her throat. 'I know you're in pain,' he said to her, 'I know what it's like to grieve.' He let go.

'Yeah?' She tapped his chin. 'Nice goatee. Really rounds out the creepy stalker look. I'll be moving on, now.' She turned to leave.

'Justine, I'm not finished.'

She whirled back around to face him, 'you know my name?'

'I know everything about you,' he said, moving closer. 'You live at seventeen twenty two, Spaulding. You stay out all night. Sleep all day. Ever since your sister was killed - six months ago. Your twin. It wasn't a mugging like the paper said, was it? Major blood loss. Two unidentifiable neck wounds.'

'So?'

'My name Is Holtz, I want to help you.'

'I'll tell you what I want,' she stepped up close, getting right into his face, 'I want you to stay the hell away from me.' And then she stalked away. Holtz watched her go.

* * *

Fred sat hunched up over her laptop. She glanced up at Cordy, as the other woman placed a cup of coffee down in front of her - and thanked her. Cordy smiled, and then moved on over to where Doyle was working - handing him a cup of his own.

Angel came down the stairs, cradling the baby in his arms. Fred looked alarmed, 'oh - we - we still haven't tracked those websites,' she told the anxious father.

'Relax,' Cordelia said to Fred, and then spoke to the vampire, 'But Doyle had a really good idea for getting in contact with them. Maybe we can trick them into telling us where to find them.'

'Uhuh,' Angel didn't seem to be listening, he was just gazing down at his son.

Cordelia left Doyle's side and went over to him. 'Get any sleep?' she asked.

'No. I was up all night watching him.'

'You know, if you'd let us take shifts we could …'

But he interrupted her, 'No. I wasn't watching him like that - I was just … watching him.' Cordelia began to smile, and Angel did likewise. 'He - looks a little bit like me, don't you think?'

'Oh yeah,' she grinned, 'look at that brow - he's a miniature you.' She reached out for the baby, 'why don't you hand him over so you can get some shut eye?'

But he twisted away from her, again, not allowing her to remove his child from his arms. 'No - I'll sleep when I know he's safe.'

'Which will be when?' she began to sound exasperated, 'around never? Angel, I understand you wanna protect him, but you gotta let go a little. Share part of the responsibility. You can't be everything for him.'

But Angel disagreed. He was all the family the baby had, since his mother had died. It was his job to be everything to him.

Cordy looked sceptical, 'OK come with me,' she said - pulling Angel towards the glass doors that led out to the courtyard. Doyle glanced up from his computer - and watched the little threesome leave the lobby.

'Where are we going?' Angel asked, still gazing down at his child. But he looked up as they stepped outside, and Cordelia continued to drag him outward - beyond the shadows of the building. The vampire stopped on the very edges of the darkness - whilst Cordelia kept going, tugging at him. 'Cordelia…'

'We're going outside,' she told him, 'in the sunshine - where your son is gonna want to play. Where you have to rush him to hospital if it gets sick in the daytime. But you can't go outside during the daytime like other parents - because you're a vampire. And even if you weren't - you can't do _everything_ for him.'

But once again, Angel begged to differ. He fixed Cordelia with his most penetrating glower and then shoved his arm out into the sun's bright rays. 'If he has to get to the hospital at noon,' he said - as smoke started to rise from his skin, 'on the sunniest day of the year, he'll get there … even if I don't.'

'Stop! Angel! Stop!' Cordy pushed his hand back into the darkness - looking worried and frustrated. 'You're acting insane.'

Angel turned to go and, frowning, Cordelia turned away from him - looking out into the yard. She blinked as something bright shone straight into her eyes, dazzling her. 'What was that?' she asked - Angel turned back around to look. 'There's something catching the light under…' she stepped towards the jasmine bushes, and reached under for whatever it was that was causing the sunshine to reflect. Her hand tightened around Doyle's hidden scotch bottle, and she pulled it out and looked at it. Bits of the sodden paper bag still clung to it. 'He lied to me,' she said, looking up at Angel, 'why would he…'

'Hey we've had a reply from one of the websites…' Doyle appeared in the doorway, looking pleased, his voice excited. But he trailed off when he saw what Cordelia held in her hand.

'You lied to me,' she said to him.

He gave a sidewards half glance at Angel, who still stood there, and then went over to his girlfriend. She was looking between him and the bottle in disbelief. 'It's nothin,' he told her. 'I just … it was cold - walking home in the rain, I stopped off for somethin' to warm me up. It's nothin'.'

'If it's nothing - then why did you hide it? And then lie about it?'

Doyle was uncomfortably aware of Angel still watching them. 'I just… I just didn't wanna upset y', is all.'

'If my boyfriend is sliding back into alcoholism then it is my _right_ to be upset,' she told him - her voice sounded furious.

'I'm not - I told y'...'

'This isn't the first time I've caught you out drinking on the quiet since…' she glanced up at Angel, and then looked back at Doyle.

'It doesn't mean anythin'.'

'It means you lied to me. Last night - you looked me in the eye and you lied. That's not OK, Doyle. If there's something wrong, if you're in pain - if there is legitimate reason why you are going back to excessive drinking...'

'I'm not…'

But she continued like he hadn't tried to interrupt. 'Then you _talk_ to me about it. Or hell - you go speak to a professional whose _job_ it is to help people like you. But if you're gonna sneak around and lie about it - then that means trouble. For you - and for us. Now if you wanna tell me what's wrong then I am here to listen - you know there is nothing more important to me in the world than you. But you gotta sort yourself out, Doyle. Because if this happens again, if I find out you lied to me, again…'

She shook her head and then, instead of finishing her sentence - dropped the bottle on the floor - where it smashed into a hundred little pieces. Doyle flinched, as the liquor pooled out on the ground, trickling down the uneven paving and seeping into the cracks. Cordelia turned and marched off - passing Angel as she went back inside.

Doyle watched her go, helplessly. Angel hadn't moved the whole time and, as Cordelia disappeared from view, the two men's eyes met. They stared at each for a long moment. Both of their faces were hard and impassive and unfriendly; there was judgement in Angel's expression - and defiance in Doyle's. And then Angel turned, and followed Cordelia inside - and Doyle watched the vampire and his impossible child chase after his own girlfriend. He sank down onto the bench and put his head in his hands. He was really screwing up.

* * *

As Angel came back inside, he saw Lorne over by the counter talking to Fred. 'Were you able to sleep at all?' she was asking, 'or could you still hear that humming?'

'Oh I got some earplugs,' the anagogic demon told her, 'put them in and slept like a baby - cried and wet the bed, all night.' Nobody even smiled, 'gee - tough room.' He looked up as the new father reached them, and draped his arm across his shoulders, looking down at the baby. He sniffed. 'Do I smell bacon - or did someone fall asleep with the curtains open?' he chuckled, 'you gotta figure, guy like you - place like this. Only safe place to sleep is the janitor's closet.'

'Thanks for the tip.'

Gunn walked in from the basement, then, and dropped a hold all onto the chair, 'mission accomplished,' he told the others, unzipping it. 'You said you wanted fire power - so…'

Angel peered into the bag. 'Good work,' he commended the street fighter.

'Also we got company out front,' Gunn told him.

As Angel began to make enquiries as to exactly who was outside waiting to break in - Doyle shuffled back inside from the courtyard, looking a little shamefaced. Angel and Cordelia ignored him and he went back to his computer, and worked quietly.

'There's two blacked out cars full of what I'm betting is more vampire cult,' Gunn was saying, 'And a biker gang I recognise from back in the day.'

'Human?'

'Yeah - into extortion and kidnapping. There was also some funky fellas in a van I didn't recognise. Wearing hoods.'

'Lilliad demons,' Wesley told them - joining them at the counter. They were a sect of demons who made a magical broth from the bones of human children. They would be very interested in seeing how a vampire child affected the recipe. They had access to strong magic - and were the only serious threat when it came to breaking the Furies' spell. 'That's with two ls.' Wesley said to Cordelia, as she began to write their name up on the enemies board.

'What are they waiting for?' Angel asked.

'Night,' Wesley told him - their power was linked to the lunar cycle.

'So we're safe for now,' Cordelia said, 'but once the moon rises...'

'Doyle,' Angel suddenly snapped. The half demon looked up. 'You said that you'd had some luck with the websites?'

'Uh… yeah - one of 'em… one of 'em has responded.' He glanced around at the others, 'what shall I tell 'em?'

'Arrange a rendezvous for tonight,' the vampire instructed, 'far away from the hotel.'

'On it.'

'But Angel,' Wesley said, 'we're trapped in here - with all of them out there.'

'And no matter what kind of weapons we have - we can't fight off the whole world, once that force field comes down,' Gunn added

'We'll fight,' Angel told them, 'because we have to. And we'll kill them all.'

The rest of the team looked doubtful.


	39. Dad: Part Three

Lilah sat on the floor, surrounded by the various files she had pulled from the cabinet. Pieces of paper were scrunched up and strewn around where she had discarded them. She was beyond frustrated, as she leafed through the current folder. 'Two hundred and seventy five years of the most inane…' she muttered to herself, '... I mean what kind of a wussy name is Liam anyway?'

She took a deep breath and looked up from the file - thinking she needed a way to narrow this down. 'OK, you're at the hotel,' she said to herself, 'the pirate is about to kill Angel. Angel calls him… what was it? Hose? Hope?'

'Holtz?' The woman behind the desk piped up.

Lilah turned to look at her. 'What?'

'Holtz, Daniel, Vampire killer,' the woman recited. 'Circa 1754. He hunted Angel and Darla halfway around the world until his mysterious disappearance in 1773. Larson McMillan Vampiricus Conquestus. Page 412.'

'You mean I've been sitting here for the last fourteen hours … only to find out that you know everything that's in this case file?'

'No, Ms. Morgan.'

'Oh.'

'I know everything in _every_ case file. I'm files and records, it's my…'

'Your job - yeah.' Lilah walked over to her and sat on the edge of her desk. 'So - I want you to tell me everything you know about Holtz - and why he has the big hate on for Angel.'

The woman leaned back and her eyes began to flicker - like a television screen with a fuzzy signal. There was a rattling noise, like files being flipped back. '1764, Angel and Darla kill Holtz, Caroline; Holtz, Sarah and Holtz, Daniel, infant son.'

'Massacred his family,' Lilah mused, 'that'll do it.'

'Holtz vows to revenge their blood, May 1764. Pursues Angel and Darla relentlessly for nine years, racking up an incidental body count of 378 vampires in the meantime.'

The lawyer looked thoughtful, 'so what we're dealing with is a single minded vengeance machine with a blood lust to match. That's just - awesome.'

* * *

The team were busy getting ready for the upcoming siege - checking weapons and barricading entrances for after the force field fell. Cordelia glanced around - noticed that everyone was busy - and seized her opportunity. She tapped Doyle on the shoulder and then beckoned him to follow her. He put down his crossbow, with a quizzical frown, and walked into Wesley's office, behind his girlfriend. She shut the door and then turned to look at him. 'OK,' she said, 'spill.'

'Spill what?'

'Whatever it is that's bugging you. Something's up, buster, and I know it. Oh right, you just _happened_ to get separated from us in the alleyway - so you just _had_ to walk home in the rain. And you just _happened_ to be cold so you just _had_ to buy yourself some scotch. And then you just _didn't want_ to upset me so you _decided_ to hide it? Nuhuh - not buying it. What's up?'

Doyle shoved his hands in his pockets and looked downwards, looking uncomfortable. 'I can't tell y',' he said to her.

'You can tell me _anything!_ ' she protested.

'You'll be mad.'

'I'm already mad - now I wanna know why.'

'It's just…' he shuffled his feet, 'you'll think badly of me if I tell y'.'

'Just spill it.' She sounded like she was running out of patience.

Doyle took a deep breath, he glanced up at her, but then decided he didn't quite dare make eye contact - and looked back down. 'I just… I don't wanna have to be around the baby,' he mumbled.

'What?'

He took his hands out of his pockets, and folded his arms defensively across his chest. 'It's just hard, Cordelia. And I know that makes me - I dunno - a bad person, or selfish or… that I can't just be happy for Angel. But I can't. I was getting used to things, adapting - in my own time - and now to have a baby shoved into the mix… to look at Angel get somethin' I can't ever have… it's just too raw for me to cope with right now. And I get that there's bigger stuff goin' on than how I feel - and I just need to suck it up… but I - I don't seem to be able to. Not this time.'

Cordelia looked like - for once - she was lost for words. 'I know this has been difficult for you,' she said to him, 'but Angel needs…'

'Yeah, yeah - I know. Angel needs us. And so we have to be there for him. Whether he'd be there for us or not - we need to be there for him. I get it. But that doesn't mean it doesn't hurt.'

'This isn't all about the baby,' Cordelia said. Doyle looked at her in surprise. 'No - it's not,' she told him. 'If a woman had turned up pregnant by Wes or Gunn, sure you might be a little sad at what you can't have - but you'd be right there for them. You'd be happy for them. You'd be helping… this is about you and Angel. This is about last year.'

Doyle sighed, and shrugged his shoulders. 'Maybe,' he said, turning his back on Cordelia, 'maybe it's a mixture of stuff - but the fact is, I feel what I feel - and there's nothin' I can do about that.'

She went up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist, 'well - you could start by talking to me - instead of going off and getting drunk.'

'Talkin' doesn't solve anythin',' he said to her, wrapping his own arms around hers. She nuzzled into his neck - and he closed his eyes. 'It doesn't stop me being infertile. It doesn't stop Angel gettin' somethin' that he… he doesn't deserve. And I have to watch that.'

'Drinking doesn't stop any of that, either,' she murmured.

'No - but it numbs the pain, some… Once Darla was gone - I was watchin' the three of you. You, Angel and the baby: together. You looked like a family. A real family.'

'I don't want to be part of a real family with Angel,' Cordelia said to him.

'Well - y' can't be part of a real family with me.'

'Sure I can!' She let go of him and twisted him back around to face her, then she placed both her hands either side of his face. 'Doyle! You're getting down because you saw me with a baby that wasn't my own. It will never be my own. The best he could ever be is my _adopted_ child. So - if that's all Angel can offer me - why on earth would I settle for that with him when I could have the exact same thing with you? We can raise a family if we decide we want to - and you will love an adopted child just as much as you would love your own. I know that's true. All this bitterness … it's your residual anger with Angel.'

'Maybe.'

'Maybe nothing - you're not happy because the man who abandoned you last year, _this_ year gets the one thing you can't have. And you think that's not fair. Well - maybe it isn't. But for God's sake, Doyle, don't destroy our relationship - and your liver - because you're angry with the dark avenger. That's nuts!'

'I guess…'

'Just - when things get bad - talk to me, OK? Let me make it better. Let me know what's bothering you - and see if I can't fix it.'

'I can't exactly say "don't ever hold the baby" without soundin' like a pathetic, petty jerk, though - can I?'

She smiled, 'no - you can't. And I'm afraid the chances are, I'm gonna have to hold the baby at some point - as will you.' Her forehead creased into a frown, 'that is - if Angel ever puts him down. But that doesn't mean that you shouldn't tell me if something I'm doing is upsetting you. This is a big deal - I get that - and I want to be sensitive to it.'

That made Doyle chuckle, and he kissed her on the forehead - 'sensitive - you?'

'I can be sensitive!' She was outraged at what he was implying. He chuckled again, and she took a deep breath and tried once more, 'what I mean is - the baby changes everything - for all of us. But one thing that absolutely remains the same - is that you are my number one priority. Always and forever. Whether Angel likes that or not.'

'No, I think Angel would quite like _him_ to be your number one priority,' Doyle muttered to himself.

'Huh?' she frowned in confusion, 'anyway - as terrible as this sounds - you matter more to me than the baby does. So - whatever you need, whatever you need me to do - to make things as easy as possible on you - just let me know. Don't sulk, and go off by yourself, and drink. It solves nothing. Talk to me - keep talking to me - it's all I ask.'

'OK.' He nodded.

'Promise?'

'Promise… hey, d'y' forgive me for drinkin' last night, then?'

She screwed her face up in thought. 'I guess we'll have to settle on me not being mad - but on thinking you're a grade A idiot.'

'I can live with that.'

She kissed him, softly, on the lips. 'Feel better?' she asked. He nodded. She smiled, 'good - because now it's time to slap on your poker face and go out there and help protect Angel's child. Can you do that?'

He sighed - but then nodded again. She kissed him, once more, and this time the kiss was longer - and grew in intensity, becoming more passionate as time passed.

'Cordelia? Doyle?' Angel's voice shouted across from the lobby, he didn't sound happy. 'You need to be out here working this!'

Cordelia broke the kiss and twisted to look over her shoulder, 'coming!' she yelled back. Then she distentangled herself from her boyfriend's arms and returned out to the vampire. After a moment, Doyle followed on behind her.

* * *

As night fell, Justine went back out on the hunt. Still a little buzzed from the alcohol, she cut an unsteady path through her usual haunts - her usual hunting grounds. She found what she was looking for in a cemetery. A vamp - maybe it lived in a mausoleum - maybe it was freshly risen - she didn't care. The kill was all that mattered.

But the vampire was strong - and the fight was hard. Not that that bothered her too much. The pain inside hurt less when her physical pain was more. She slugged the vampire across the jaw - and it kicked her across the graveyard. She stumbled backwards - into the shades of a tree - but, before she fell, she felt strong arms grip her and hold her upright. She turned to look - it was her stalker from this morning. 'What the hell are you doing here?' she demanded.

'Watching you fight,' Holtz replied.

She left him to it - and reentered the fray. She raised her stake, ready to plunge it into the vampire's heart. But it knocked it from her hand and pushed her to the ground, climbing on top of her. It was just about to sink its teeth into her neck when it exploded, suddenly, in a cloud of dust. Holtz stood above her, holding a stake. He held out his hand, and helped her to her feet.

'Why did you wait so long?' she asked.

'I wanted to see if you could win.'

'Always. I would have kicked his ass, if you weren't here. You distracted me.'

But Holtz was not sure that he was her problem. She was a good fighter but she was all emotion and no strategy. Her passion worked against her.

'Are you're here to teach me about passion?' She asked sceptically.

'I'm here to teach you how to fight,' he replied.

'And what's in for you?'

'You help me kill a vampire.'

Justine looked even more disbelieving. This guy had just saved her - and could clearly hold his own against vampires. He was even giving her pointers - he clearly believed in his own competence. What did he need her to kill one vampire for?

'This one is strong,' he told her. 'I know you, Justine. Your life has been ruined. You can't sleep. Instead, you wander the streets making others pay for what happened to your sister. That is where I can help. I see your talent. And I see your hate. And I know that I can shape and hone you into an instrument of vengeance.'

'Sounds like fun,' Justine said.

'It won't be.'

* * *

As the full moon rose, the Lilliad demons stood in front of the hotel and began to chant - working their magics to bring the barrier down.

Gunn watched them, from a window on the first storey - and then turned and went to the head of the stairs - looking down into the lobby. 'Guys - those Lilliad demons are working their mojo on the force field.'

Down in the lobby, the gang picked up their weapons. Gunn returned to the window - just in time to see the cars with the blacked out windows pull up. 'Oh right - sun's down, vamps are out,' he yelled. 'Wait - they're headed towards the bikers.'

'What are they doing?' Fred called up to him.

Gunn left the window and came down the stairs, 'they're - ah - having a brawl about who gets to kill us first.'

'Well that's comforting,' Doyle muttered to himself - getting an arrow ready in his crossbow - and checking that his axe was close by for hand to hand combat.

Cordelia was stood beside him, gripping her sword tightly, 'maybe their brawling can thin the herd for us,' she said hopefully. 'Less people to kill us if they die in the pre-fight fight outside.'

'Kinda hopin' the vamps win,' Doyle said to her, 'If the biker gang storms the hotel - what are _we_ gonna do?'

'We need to hold our ground,' Wesley said, picking up a flame thrower.

'And if we can't?' Cordelia asked.

'If we're forced to fall back then we'll do so towards the cellar. We can make a retreat through the sewer,' the boss said.

Angel appeared on the stairs - the ever-present bundle in his arms. 'This isn't gonna work,' he said, 'this plan - it won't work.'

Lorne looked up, from where he was sitting at the counter, 'I'm so glad somebody finally said that, because sitting here waiting to die never was much of a plan. Sorry. So, what kind of genius idea do you have hidden up that well tailored sleeve of yours, huh?'

'Plan is: I go. Take the baby somewhere safe.'

Everyone stared up at him in disbelief. He started to walk down the stairs. 'My child was born in a siege, he's not gonna die in one.' He began to hastily stuff things into a bag.

Wesley watched him - a growing look of surprise and frustration on his face. 'But if you stay and help us fight… you said it yourself, this is war.'

'And now I'm in retreat.' He zipped the bag up and began to head for the cellar.

Doyle looked down, biting his lip - but he didn't say anything. Wesley however, was not finished. 'What happened to taking them out?'

'There's too many of them. I can get out through the sewers. With any luck I'll get a couple of miles before anyone notices I'm gone.'

'So you're just gonna leave us?' Cordelia asked, 'run away?'

'Cordy - just leave it,' Doyle said, still not looking at Angel.

Gunn was looking at Angel, though, and his young face was angry. 'Why not?' he said, 'that's what he's good at. Sure you don't wanna fire us first…?'

Doyle inhaled sharply, but Gunn ignored him. 'Little icing on the cake,' he continued, 'while you leave us here to do the fighting?' The half demon shook his head and bit his lip again. He still couldn't bring himself to look at Angel.

Lorne looked panicked, 'I thought we already established this as a bad, bad idea?'

But Angel shook his head, 'No, you're gonna be alright. Once they break the spell and storm the place, they'll realise that the baby's gone and they'll go after me. Wesley, stall them if you can.'

Cordelia left Doyle's side, and went to block Angel's path. He pulled up short and looked at her. Like Gunn, her face was a mask of anger. 'I'm sure tripping over our dead bodies will slow them down. You really didn't hear a thing I said to you, earlier, did you?'

The vampire barged past her, 'I heard you.' He headed for the door.

Fred watched him go, a look of anguish on her face. 'Angel!' she cried, imploringly, 'don't leave us!' But Angel opened the door and disappeared down into the cellar without so much as a backward glance.

* * *

Lilah switched off the monitor she had just been watching … it was the feed from the hidden camera in Wesley's office - she had watched the tape back. She smiled to herself - yeah, sure - she'd sworn off hurting the half breed for no good reason - but that didn't mean she was going to stop collecting all the info on him she could. Just in case it ever came in useful - for The Senior Partners, of course - not for her. And she had just witnessed a _very_ intimate and interesting conversation between him and Cordelia.

She thought about going over all the other old tapes and transcripts, see if the little mongrel had spilled out anymore dark secrets whilst he didn't know he was being recorded. She wrinkled her nose up - as a thought hit her - she'd have to ask if they'd planted a bug in Doyle's bedroom … that would most likely be where he let slip most secrets - where he and Cordelia were sure none of the rest of the fang gang would disturb them. It was a shame Gavin hadn't thought to bug Cordelia's apartment, as well...

'He's running away,' she heard Gavin say - and she went over to the monitor that he and Linwood were viewing. It was the one that showed the lobby - and the entire team, infertile half demon included, were gathered there - waiting for the fight. But sure enough, Angel had the now ever present bundle in his arms - and was headed towards the basement.

'He's _sneaking_ away,' Linwood corrected Gavin, 'and giving us the chance to get the jump on everyone.'

Gavin spoke into his radio - telling the alpha team where the vampire was headed. There was a crackle down the line, and the head of the alpha team responded that they copied.

'Today is a different world,' Linwood mused, as he watched Angel creep through the cellar headed for the sewer access. 'A vampire has sacrificed herself for her baby. Do you know what that means?'

'That's there's something good about the kid?' Lilah guessed.

But that was not what Linwood meant. 'This child can grow up and hunt each and every one of us down.' He looked between his two junior associates. 'Let's not let that happen, shall we?'

'No, sir,' Gavin replied. 'We'll find the baby by sunrise, dead or alive.'

Lilah looked scandalised. 'Are you insane?' she asked him.

Gavin smirked at her; in a pitying, patronising sort of way. 'What? Is Lilah worried that we're gonna hurt the itty biddy baby?'

'No, you idiot.' Typical male - assuming that she had some kind of maternal instinct that left her weak. She was always being underestimated in just how ruthless she could be. Apart from Angel, she supposed - and Doyle, now… all other men underestimated her. Just her luck that the only men who could see her for what she was truly capable of were brown nosing dogooders that she couldn't stand to be in the same room with, even if they weren't her mortal enemies. 'I'm worried that you'll kill the kid before we have a chance to cut him open whilst he's still breathing and find out how the hell he's alive, in the first place,' she said to the real estate lawyer - her tone icy and withering.

Linwood glanced at her and smiled, proudly.

* * *

Angel hurried through the sewers - all was silent around him, save for the tramping of his feet. He carried the bag and, as ever, kept the baby blankets wrapped carefully around his precious cargo - and held close to his chest. He needed to surface away from the hotel and then double back for his car. This had to work. Staying and fighting with his friends would accomplish nothing - their enemies were too great. The team would be cut down, one by one, until there were none of them left standing - and then some demon or monster or evil overlord would take his child. But running away might work. A good soldier - a true warrior - knew when to stand and fight ... and when to go into retreat. And he was the champion of the team - this was his call.

He reached the ladder leading to out of the sewers, and began to climb - one handed.

* * *

Two humvees pulled up at the kerbside - around the back of the hotel. The radio, inside the first car, crackled and Lilah's voice came down the line from the office. 'Alpha team, where are you? Over.'

The leader of the squad picked up the transmitter, 'we're here,' he told her.

* * *

The team lined up facing the front door - they held their weapons at the ready. Doyle held a crossbow - primed and ready - and his trusty axe lay on the counter, beside him. Cordelia stood next to him - her sword gripped in her hand ready for the start of combat, just as Angel had taught her. She was gripping it so hard, her knuckles were turning white. 'You OK, Darlin'?' he asked her.

She nodded, 'I'm ready - I'd just feel better if…'

'Angel hadn't left us? I guess we know where we stand with him now - canon fodder to stand in front of his miracle child.' His voice was bitter.

Outside, the Lilliad demons - wearing their hooded robes, so their faces were obscured - finished their chanting. There was a crackle - and then a flash - and the force field came down. The hooded demons ran at the hotel. 'Here we go,' muttered Doyle, 'Good luck, Princess.'

'You too,' she flashed a worried smile at him, 'Nothing brave or stupid though - don't be a hero.'

'I never am,' he assured her.

...

Gunn jumped up and down, shrugging his shoulders as if to loosen his muscles - as the demons streamed towards the doorway. He looked over at Wesley - who stood firm - a grim expression on his face. 'What are you doing?' He asked.

'Imagining myself as John Wayne in Rio Bravo,' the British man replied, 'you?'

'Austin Stoker - Assault on Precinct Thirteen.'

They slapped their hands together - and then returned to their positions. Cordelia rolled her eyes. 'Maybe - if we survive this - you should trade in the DVD players for a life?' she suggested.

'They're comin',' Doyle warned - but before the Lilliad demons could reach the hotel, they were intercepted by the vampire cult and the biker gang. A three way melee broke out - as each faction fought the other two - killing off their opponents - in the hope of being the first ones into the hotel. 'Oh - I guess - forget it.' The Irish man said.

'Whatever happens out there,' Cordy said to him, 'we're gonna have to fight the winners.'

'But our odds are better.'

'And you a gambling man, dog,' Gunn shouted over his shoulder.

'And the house always wins,' said Wesley - aiming his flamethrower at the doorway - making sure he was ready.

...

Outside, the brutal and bloody slaughter of the three groups continued. The team stayed very still - and waited.

* * *

Cautiously, Angel pushed the manhole cover to one side - and then climbed out and up onto the sidewalk. He had selected the right exit - he was right by his car. His arms still full, he kicked the manhole cover back into place and then glanced around the street. Then he got into the Plymouth.

...

Inside the first Humvee, the squad leader watched the vampire through night vision goggles. 'Got him,' he announced.

There was the sound of the engine roaring to life, and then Angel's convertible pulled out and drove down the road.

The squad leader lowered his binoculars, 'have visual,' he said to the driver, 'let's go.' The Humvee pulled out and tailed Angel's car. The second truck followed on behind.


	40. Dad: Part Four

Back outside the Hyperion, two of the demons and a vampire broke free from the brawl and stumbled towards the hotel - trying to pull each other back. They tumbled through the front door and met the team waiting for them inside in grim silence. One of the Lilliads lowered its hood. 'Where is the child?' It asked.

The team all glanced at each other. 'Upstairs,' Wesley told him, 'room three one two, why don't you go and get him? Oh wait. I have a better idea…' he aimed the flame thrower and fired. The red hot flames shot across the lobby, engulfing the demons and the vampire - and the creatures began to scream.

...

Outside, the fighting continued - each faction desperately trying to annihilate the others so that they might be the ones who laid hands on the miracle child. As a vampire knocked out a biker, he looked up and saw Angel's convertible streaking past. He knocked another man to the floor - and then saw the humvees in hot pursuit. He realised.

...

'Master!' he abandoned the fight and came running through the door. 'It's a trick! He's taken the child!' he stumbled over the bodies of the dead Lilliads and looked down at their charred and burned remains. He looked up at the team. Wesley shrugged - and then fired again. The vampire screamed as the flames hit him - and then he exploded into dust.

...

The fight outside the hotel began to break up, as the brawlers realised that they had been tricked; that the vampire had left the hotel and taken the baby with him. They each hurried to their own vehicles and then drove off, with a squeal of tyres, chasing down the humvees and the convertible and the miracle child.

...

Inside the lobby, Wesley put down his flamethrower and sank down onto a stool. Cordy lowered her sword, 'now they're all after him,' she said.

'Let's just hope we stalled them for long enough,' Wesley said, sighing.

But Gunn just shrugged. 'Whatever,' he said, sitting down next to Wesley, 'running away was his call.'

'Yeah - well - from one battle to the next,' Doyle said, he looked at his watch, 'those of us that are goin' need to get to the rendezvous with the demons from the website. We got more big uglies to squish.'

Fred looked down at the still smouldering corpses of the hooded demons, 'and I guess the rest of us will start the cleanup, here. This hotel has seen too much violence in the past two days.'

'Well - hopefully tonight will be an end to it,' Doyle replied, picking up his axe, 'c'mon Gunn - we need to take your truck.'

* * *

Angel's car screeched around the corner; its back end flying out and its wheels spinning, furiously, as it tried to take the sharp bend at high speed. The humvees, the biker gang, the vampire cars and the Lilliad's truck all thundered after it - chasing it down, relentlessly.

Another humvee came roaring out of nowhere - down a side street, cutting off Angel's escape route. The vampire twisted the steering wheel hard right - and screamed down the next round. He twisted and turned his way towards the city limits - never taking his foot off the gas, the whole time.

* * *

Fred mopped up the scorch marks from the lobby floor. They were fresh - and they didn't take long to come out… though, as she was cleaning, she noticed older burn marks, already staining the surface. She frowned - clearly the Lilliad demon were not the first nasties to get toasted here in the lobby. She thought she might ask Gunn if he knew what had happened to cause the first set of marks.

The door to the cellar opened, and she glanced up. Wesley and Lorne walked through - dusting their hands off. 'Did you get rid of them?' she asked. They had taken the demon bodies down into the basement in order to dispose of them.

'Dropped them down into the sewer,' Lorne said to her, 'and boy do I never want to open that access door again - phewee! Talk about a bad smell.'

'Well - I guess I'm done here,' she motioned to the newly clean floor, 'I just hope we can go a few days without some other bugugly breakin' in and tryin' to kill us all,' she smiled, 'I'm tired of cleaning up massacres.'

'It has been a full on couple of days,' Wesley agreed.

Fred got to her feet. 'OK - then, scrubbing done, why don't I just go upstairs and….'

'Excellent idea, Fred,' Wesley smiled, 'just what I was thinking - I'll come with you.'

'And the green guy makes three,' Lorne said. The three of them began to climb the stairs - Lorne and Fred went ahead, chatting excitedly. Wesley followed on behind - casting irritated glances at the green demon's back.

* * *

Angel had reached the outskirts of the city and was now driving through a tunnel. As he came back out into the open, he sped down the highway - passing a sign for the Mojave Desert. There was vast nothingness on either side of the road. The vampire glanced in his mirror, to check on his pursuers. Then he glanced down at the bundle still cradled in his left arm. 'We'll get through this,' he said, 'I promise. The vampire/demon/biker posse - that's the easy part.' The Humvee rammed his car from behind - he ignored it. 'The part that scares me is all the questions. Why is the sky blue? Why do people get sick? Why is there always pig's blood in the fridge? I don't have all the answers!... Well, I do to that last one.'

The Hummvee rammed him again - just as they drove past a 'No Trespassing' sign for an abandoned mine shaft. That was what he had been looking for. 'Here we go,' he said to the bundle in his arms. He wrenched on the steering wheel again, this time turning it left - the car crashed through the latched wooden gate, which blocked the mine from the road.

The other cars followed him.

He drove past an abandoned shack; the old offices and maintenance room - and the head frame, which still loomed up towards the night sky. He kept on driving until he smashed through the boards which sealed off the mine shaft itself. Then he screeched to a halt, got out of the car - and began to run down into the earth.

The other vehicles pulled up and the various factions fell out and headed for the opening. They continued to fight, even as they progressed towards the mine - still desperate to not let any of the other groups get their hands on the baby, first. Their fighting afforded Angel more time to prepare.

He found another entrance - but it was still nailed shut - so he ran on into another tunnel mouth. This one was blocked off by an iron grate. The first of his pursuers were now in the mine shaft and headed towards him. He whirled around to face them - and glanced down into the blankets still held in his arms. 'It could be worse,' he said, 'at least you're not crying.'

* * *

Gunn's truck drove slowly through Griffith Park - headed for the old zoo. He pulled up by one of the animal enclosures that had been left in situ - and the three of them got out. 'We're a bit early,' Doyle said, checking his watch. He glanced over at Cordelia, who held a bundle of baby blankets in her arms, she cradled them as if she were holding an infant. 'Y' sure you're OK doin' this, darlin'?' he asked her, 'Me or Gunn could do the handover.'

'I've got it,' she told him, 'you guys have my back.'

'I just don't like puttin' you in danger.'

'When are we not in danger?' she asked him, sounding amused, 'besides, it just looks more natural that the woman would be holding the baby. And if you're not happy with _that_ then you'll have to take it up with several millennia of patriarchy. We don't want these demons getting suspicious too early.'

'So what kind of demons we expecting?' Gunn asked. He had his homemade hubcap axe with him. Its blade shone in the moonlight. He was looking forward to using it - he hadn't got any piece of the action during the entire siege. All that build up and then no release? Nuhuh - he wanted a good kill in before the night was through.

But Doyle shrugged at his question. 'I dunno,' he said. 'I just hope they're not too big and nasty… and that there's not too many of 'em.'

'We totally got this,' Cordelia said, 'and we'll put the word out that the other websites had better dry up pronto.'

They saw some head lights in the distance, getting closer. 'Well, get ready,' Doyle said, 'show's about to start.'

* * *

Gavin and Linwood were glued to their radio set - listening in to find out what was happening with the car chase.

Lilah left them to it, heading back to the monitors to see what was happening back at the hotel - to see if she could pick up any more juicy tidbits via Gavin's surveillance equipment. She flipped the monitor on - it showed the lobby - empty. The gang seemed to have cleared out. She frowned, and began to flick through the channels - checking all the feeds. Wes' office was likewise empty, as was the basement, and the landings. She found the feed that linked up to Doyle's bedroom - and remembered that for later - and then kept flicking. The half breed's room was empty, anyway - same as everywhere else.

Eventually, she reached the channel that showed Angel's suite of rooms. The new, skinny chick and the Brit were in there - along with the lounge lizard from Caritas. She squinted at what they were doing… it didn't make sense … they couldn't be … 'uh, sir?' she called over to Linwood, 'I think you might wanna see this.'

* * *

The car came to a stop just outside of the picnic area; where the three team members were stood, waiting. The headlights were killed.

'We're not gonna get a good look at 'em,' Doyle muttered. 'We're not gonna know what we're up against.'

'Would you relax?' Cordy hissed, 'I got this.' She bounced the blankets up and down in her arms, as she would a real baby, and looked down into the soft folds - as if she was peering into a newborn's face. She hadn't had much of an opportunity to do any acting recently, it felt good to flex her muscles this evening.

Five demons appeared in the clearing. They were tall - easily as tall as Gunn, and broad with it. They wore chain-mail shirts - and had spines that grew from their scalps, like bony Mohawks. Their skin was scaly and mottled bright yellow and purple. Their eyes were completely black and their teeth were sharp.

'Gurnash demons,' Doyle muttered, 'figures - they suck children's life forces and sell them on the black market. You can get good money in some demon circles for the life force of an innocent. I bet essence of a miracle child would go for ten times normal market value - at least.' He glanced at Cordelia, 'you still sure you got this?'

'Oh yeah,' she said. She jigged the blankets up and down in her arms, and made some soothing noises towards it. Then she stepped forward - but not too close.

'You got the kid?' One of the Gurnash demons said.

'Uhuh - right here,' Cordelia said. 'We had to fight off vampires and Lilliad demons to get to it. You got the cash?'

The demon raised a metal briefcase.

'Good - put it down on the floor - and slide it towards us. Then I'll give you the baby.'

'No deal,' the demon snarled, 'baby first.'

'What?' Cordelia sounded outraged, 'you think this is our first rodeo? You think we've never kidnapped a child and sold it before? Unlike this kid - we were not born yesterday! Cash first or no baby - there are at least two other websites offering money for it.'

'Fine.' The Gurnash demon placed the briefcase on the floor and then used his foot to slide it over towards Cordelia.

'Thanks,' she used her own foot to push it backwards towards Doyle and Gunn. then she stepped closer to the demon, 'here.'

The demon frowned. 'Kinda looks bulky for a baby,' he said - just as Cordelia stepped up right in front of him. As he frowned downwards, Cordy whipped the blankets away revealing the flamethrower. Then she fired. The Gurnash demon went up in a fireball and stumbled backwards, screaming.

'It's a trap!' yelled a second demon, 'they double crossed us!' The four remaining demons launched themselves forward - trying to reclaim the money. Cordelia fired again - and another demon fell, screaming in agony as the flames seared his flesh. The rest of them met Gunn and Doyle, wearing his own demon face for the fight, and the two of them swung their axes. Gunn beheaded one - and Doyle axed another in the chest. It fell to the ground - green blood spurting from its wound.

The remaining Gurnash saw the destruction and fell back, choosing to abandon the briefcase full of money in return for its life. 'It's getting away,' Cordelia yelled - she began to chase after it. A moment later, Gunn over took her and - with a yell - leapt on the fleeing demon, bringing him down in a rugby tackle. Cordelia came to a stop - and pointed her flamethrower. Doyle came up beside her and held his axe firmly - its blade was still dripping with the gore of the fallen Gurnash.

The demon on the floor looked up at them in fright. 'You've got one chance to live, bud,' Doyle said - allowing the oozing green blood to drip onto the prone Gurnash - 'so I suggest y' listen to our little offer.'

Cordelia stood ready to fire again. 'You're gonna go back to all your little Gurnash friends and take down your website,' she told him. 'You're gonna tell them what happened here - and let them know that if they _ever_ come near Angel's baby again, they will be so _very_ beyond sorry. Remember - we're just the sidekicks - you get the dark avenger mad - what do you think he's gonna do to you?'

'And I suggest,' Gunn finished up, 'that in the spirit of good citizenship - seein' as how you're so up with technology and all - that you track down all the other folks buildin' websites about the miracle child… and warn them off it, too. Would hate to have to come back and massacre your ass 'cause I got my axe dirty slayin' some _nasty_ demon that you were supposed to have dealt with. Understand?'

The Gurnash demon nodded and Gunn released him. It got to its feet and fled back to the car. There was the sound of the engine firing up - and then they saw tail lights disappearing rapidly.

'Well, not a bad day's work for us, I think,' Doyle said, wiping his brow with his sleeve.

'Yeah - we got paid and everything!' Cordelia squealed in delight. She raced back to where the briefcase still lay on the ground - surrounded by slaughtered demons. She wrinkled her nose, 'there's gonna be some grossed out picnickers tomorrow,' she said. Then she looked back at the men, 'We better go, then, and … you know…'

The two men nodded, and the three of them got back into the pickup and drove away.

* * *

The demons, bikers and commandos began to close in. Angel glanced up and grabbed the rope that trailed down from the ceiling. 'Give us the baby!' A Liliiad demon demanded.

Angel looked at him, 'you want the baby?' he asked 'You can have the baby.' He launched the bundle that he had carried so carefully, for so long, into a high arc. The blankets flew through the air and fell down in the middle of all the factions. They each fell upon it, scrambling to be the ones to lay hands on it.

In the meantime, Angel yanked the rope and activated the pulley at the top of the mine shaft. He rode the rope all the way to the top and scrambled out.

A vampire was victorious. It seized the blankets, and folded them back so he could get a look at the miracle child.

...

Angel's car backed out of the mine shaft, screeched around in a u-turn and then - with a squeal of tyres - began to drive away.

...

The vampire stared at the teddy wrapped in the blanket. There was a bomb strapped to its chest - and a timer, which had almost ticked back down to zero. He looked up in horror.

'What is it?' one of the commandos asked.

'It's a ….'

...

The fireball rolled out of the mine shaft, exploding out into the open air. The flickering flames cast a red glow over the tail lights of Angel's escaping car.

* * *

Doyle and Cordy pushed the doors to the waiting room open, 'you ready for this?' She asked him.

He nodded, 'as I'll ever be.'

They went inside. Fred and Wesley were already in there, sitting on a sofa. Fred cradled the baby in her arms. 'You got out of the hotel OK?' Cordelia asked them, 'no one followed you?'

'We were fine,' Fred assured her - 'how did it go with…' but she was cut off by a doctor entering the room. 'I'm sorry for the wait,' the doctor smiled, 'shall we go?' and the four of them took Angel's baby in for his newborn checkup.

* * *

The three lawyers stood watching the tape back from that morning - of the gang in the lobby. On screen, Lorne draped his arm around Angel. ' _Do I smell bacon - or did someone fall asleep with the curtains open? You gotta figure - guy like you - place like this - the only safe place is…'_

'Stop the tape,' Linwood commanded. The image on the screen froze. 'Magnify one hundred times,' the image got bigger, 'and again.'

The whole screen was now filled with the picture of Lorne's hand slipping a folded bit of paper into Angel's breast pocket. 'There,' the senior lawyer pronounced, 'there is where he gives Angel the note.'

The tape started up again. ' _In the janitor's closet,'_ Lorne said.

' _Thanks for the tip,'_ the vampire replied.

'And that's where he tells him where to read it - the janitor's closet. Where we don't have surveillance.' Linwood was annoyed.

Lilah looked over at Gavin - she struggled to keep a smirk off her face, but she was very pleased that Gavin's flawless plan had come crashing down around his ears. 'That green house guest could hear the hum of your transmit frequency,' she said, 'What are the odds?' Gavin scowled at her.

'All that Sturm and Drang about Angel running out on them?' Linwood said, 'just a performance.'

Lilah struggled to hide her smirk again. But she had to admit the vampire had done a good job. She hadn't realised he had acting chops.

'Are you kidding?' Gavin asked - he was still sulking that his brilliant scheme had hit a snag. 'It was one note. Felt forced.'

Lilah didn't even bother to try and hide her smirk this time. 'Funny. You seemed to fall for it at the time.'

But Linwood had moved on and was now being thoughtful: this didn't have to be a disaster for them. Angel taking out all those different factions would help thin the herd - they stood a better chance now. He moved on to discuss Holtz - hoping that he would have been amongst Angel's casualties. But Gavin told him that there was no evidence that he had been amongst the pursuers - and so, most likely, was still out there.

'Pity,' Linwood said, 'what do we know about him?'

Lilah filled him in on the information she had discovered down in files and records - that he was a vampire hunter, whose family had been killed by Angel and who had spent the rest of his life seeking revenge. 'Oh - and one more thing,' she finished up, 'this all happened over 200 years ago.'

Linwood frowned, 'I thought Holtz was human?'

'He is.'

'A time traveller?'

'His arrival was foretold in the Nyazian scrolls,' Gavin said, 'he's a player.'

But this wasn't enough for the senior attorney. 'We need more information,' he said. 'How he got here, who he works with, where he lives … it is only a matter of time before our needs and his come into conflict…' a loud alarm began to sound throughout the building and the three lawyers glanced upward, 'maybe sooner than we think,' Linwood finished.

The door to the office was thrown open, then, and Angel strode in. He walked straight up to Linwood and then slashed him across the cheek - then he grabbed him and pressed him face down against the table.

'My son has a tiny scratch on his cheek,' the vampire said, 'and now - by extraordinary coincidence - so do you. I'm holding you personally responsible for anything that happens to him - whether it's your fault or not. Cold, sunburn, scratched knee; whatever happens to him happens to you - and then some.'

He pulled the lawyer up and then shoved him so he was sat in his large leather chair. Angel put his hands on the arm rest and leaned down - menacing. 'For not only are you not coming after him,' he said, 'you're gonna make sure he lives a long and healthy life. You just became his godfather, understand?'

Linwood nodded, 'I believe I do.'

Angel began to walk out - but he turned back once he reached the doorway, 'oh - and college fund? Start saving now - I've got my heart set on Notre Dame.'

* * *

'Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Angel,' the doctor smiled at Fred and Wesley, 'I'm pleased to report you have a perfectly healthy baby boy.'

'Oh,' Fred blushed and began to giggle, 'we're not the parents.'

'My apologies,' the doctor said, turning to Doyle and Cordelia, 'well - I'm pleased to report _you_ have a perfectly healthy baby boy.'

The young couple looked at each other for a long moment. Fred was aware of something unseen - and unsaid - passing between them, and she wondered what she was missing. Then Cordelia smiled and told the doctor it wasn't them either. The doctor looked confused, 'I don't understand…'

'The father is on his way,' Wesley explained, 'the mother is… out of the picture.'

'Oh. I see. Well, his height and weight are in the ninety percentile. We gave him his vitamin K and his PKU and he's doing very well. But we don't seem to have … what's his name?'

The four team members all looked at each other - nonplussed. 'Uhmmm…'

'Connor,' Angel said, walking into the room, 'his name is Connor.'

'Connor,' the doctor repeated, and wrote it down on the chart. 'Thank you - Mr. Angel?' He glanced at the four people who had brought them the baby, unsure as to whether this was the real father this time. Wesley nodded. 'Congratulations,' the doctor said to the vampire - and handed the baby over to him.

'Thanks.'

...

The team went back out into the waiting area. ' _Mr._ Angel?' the vampire asked his friends - as he stared down into Connor's tiny face.

'We had to tell them something,' Cordelia explained.

'Your first name's Geraldo,' Fred supplied. Angel looked aggrieved at having such a ridiculous name foisted upon him and - despite everything that he was feeling at that moment - Doyle had to hide a snicker behind his sleeve.

The double doors to the waiting area swung open and Gunn walked in, pushing an empty stroller. 'Here we go,' he announced, 'got the best one money could buy.'

'That's nice,' Angel said looking impressed.

'Yeah, well - we got paid big today,' the street fighter told him, 'the baby earned his keep - we can afford this.'

'Yeah - I'm wondering if we maybe did the wrong thing getting that Gurnash demon to put the word out to shut down all the websites,' Cordelia mused, 'we could have set a whole load more traps - extorted a whole lot of money out of unsavoury types.'

'Not really fittin' the whole hero bio though, darlin',' Doyle smiled at her, 'we gotta do what's morally right - not what gets us the most money.'

'And that's why we'll always be poor,' she replied - looking glum. Her despondent look changed to one of surprise though - when Angel suddenly handed her the baby. 'Oh!'

'Take him,' the vampire said, 'he'll make you feel better.'

Fred and Wesley crowded around her, ahhing at the baby. Over their shoulders, Cordelia's worried eyes met Doyle's. She gave him a swift, sad smile, and then looked back at Connor. 'Hey baby,' she said, jigging him up and down, 'do you wanna go for a little ride?' She knelt down and strapped him into the stroller - before taking a step back and holding Doyle's hand.

Wesley and Fred continued to coo over the baby. 'Connor,' Wesley said, 'it's a lovely name - I don't suppose you ever considered Wes…'

'No,' everyone else said at once.

Fred looked between the baby and the vampire, 'not to be negative,' she said, 'but we're OK - right? Nothing else is coming after Connor - or us?'

'No,' Angel told them all, 'we're safe for the time being. Come on - let's go home.' And, led by Angel pushing the stroller, the whole family left the hospital together. A warm and happy smile was playing on Angel's face.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reminder - although Birthday would be the next canonical episode, it has been moved to later in the season for this rewrite so the next episode will move straight on to 'Provider'.


	41. Provider: Part One

Cordelia took a sip of her coffee and tried to concentrate on sorting the bills in front of her - for once they actually had the cash to pay before their final notice. But this wasn't good enough for the vampire, and his counting was distracting her. 'Sixty, seventy, eighty, one, two, three.'

She looked up at him and frowned, 'Angel,' but he held a hand up to stop her and dropped the last few coins into a piggy bank. Then he went and locked it in the safe behind the picture on the wall.

Fred looked up from where she was snuggling with Connor on the round sofa, 'How's the college fund going?' she smiled.

'There was a dollar eighty three in the cushions out there,' he told her, 'that's perfectly good money just going to waste.' He went over to Doyle's desk, where the half demon was working away on his computer. 'How far away are we from going live?' he asked.

'Just a few moments - website's nearly finished.'

Angel pointed to the phrase "No Case Too Small" which was directly under their "We Help the Hopeless" tagline. 'Can you make that a bit bigger?' he asked, 'but you know still tasteful?'

Doyle rolled his eyes. 'Cordy chose the font and designed the layout,' he told the vampire, 'she has better taste than you.'

'I just think…'

'If you want people to use the website then it's gotta look good,' Doyle said, 'no one's gonna take us seriously, as a business, if you make me turn our website into some flashin' tacky Vegas showgirl lookin' thing. I'm tellin' y' man - this looks good.'

Cordelia came over to also look at the screen, 'he's right,' she agreed, 'it does look good - as with so many things - I have a real flair for design. And Doyle's done a great job building it. Leave this stuff to the experts, Angel. Sometimes other people _do_ know more than you - accept that.'

'Speaking of people who know more than me,' he turned back to Doyle, 'did you speak to your contacts about finding Holtz?'

Doyle sighed, 'yeah, bud - between buildin' you a website; babysittin' your kid _and_ passin' along messages from the higher powers, I found time to ring round my contacts. Nothin'.'

'What do you mean "nothing"?'

'I mean nothin'. Holtz is not makin' a big splash in the criminal underworld scene.'

'Well, what about your demon contacts, huh? Did you try them?'

'Gunn's gang killed them all,' the half demon replied, 'so unless Holtz gets a big yen on for a game o' kitten poker - I don't think I'm gonna find him amongst my… less human acquaintances.'

Cordelia frowned, 'what the hell is _kitten poker?_ ' she asked.

'Exactly what it sound like,' Angel told her, 'Doyle, here, plays poker for kittens. Most demons eat them, they're good currency.'

' _What?'_ She sounded aghast.

'I don't eat 'em!' Doyle protested, flashing an irritated glance at the vampire. 'I sell the ones I win onto pet stores - keep 'em safe, like.'

'I can't believe you play poker for baby cats!'

'Yeah, well - the world's a funny old place.'

Angel left them to their bickering and went to retrieve his son from Fred. He took the baby in his arms and smiled down at him, 'hello baby, how are you doing?'

'He's been missing his daddy,' Fred smiled, standing up and heading over to the counter.

Angel followed her over, 'Well, papa's got mouths to feed.' He arrived back at the computer, 'is it ready yet?' he asked, his words were aimed at Doyle, but spoken to Connor - in the gentle, babying voice always used on infants and animals. 'We gotta get the word out so this little one can eat, yes we do.'

Cordelia watched the vampire fuss with his child. 'I'm glad you wanna take care of your son, I am,' she said to him, 'but we can't lose sight of the mission.'

'We have to earn a living,' Angel said looking up from Connor in order to face her - his voice back to normal. 'Not just for him - for all of us.'

'I agree,' she replied, 'but first and foremost we work for The Powers, help the hopeless.'

'She's not wrong, bud,' Doyle added, 'everythin' we do - everythin' we've ever done, stems from my visions, remember?' It was Angel's turn to flash an irritated glance at the half demon.

'Just promise me we won't neglect that,' Cordelia finished up.

'I promise,' Angel said, just as Gunn walked through the front door, 'I promise.' He turned away from the concerned woman, in order to speak to the street fighter: 'well?' Cordelia sighed and shook her head. She caught Doyle's eye - and he twisted his mouth into a wry smile. Neither of them believed Angel.

'Well, we hired some guys,' Gunn was saying to Angel, 'six thousands of these babies have been placed all over town.' He held up a flyer with the Angel Investigations logo on it.

'Nice!' Angel took it and showed it to Cordelia, 'I'd phone me - wouldn't you?'

'OK,' Doyle called, 'website's up - we're live.' Everyone gathered around the computer to look.

'There,' the vampire beamed, 'we're live, beautiful. Ladies and Gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome to a new era of Angel Investigations. All we have to do now is wait - for that phone to start ringing and the money to start rolling in...' Cordelia and Doyle exchanged another look, but Angel carried on regardless, 'because someone's gotta clothe and feed and educate this little guy, yeah?' Connor yawned in reply, and Angel grinned even more widely. 'Yeah, all we have to do is wait, just a matter of time…' Connor began to fuss, 'don't you worry, this town is full of people who have problems.'

* * *

A man ran through the streets, the rain poured down on him. He glanced back over his shoulder, in desperation - a looming shadow was bearing down on him. He fled on into the night - his feet pounding down the asphalt; his heart drumming wildly in his chest; all keeping time with the driving rain. As he ran onward, he smashed into a line of trash cans and tumbled down; the cans clattering to floor with him - spilling out their garbage. Now his eyes were at floor level, he noticed a yellow flyer lying in the gutter. He snatched it up - and stared at the AI logo…

* * *

...The whole team stood around the counter, staring at the phone. It stayed resolutely silent. 'Any moment now,' Angel said…

* * *

...The man ran to a payphone, snatched up the receiver and began to dial the number on the leaflet. It began to ring. 'Come on, come on,' he urged...

* * *

...The crew continued to stare at the silent phone…

* * *

...He heard the phone pick up. 'Hello, Fabrizio's pizza,' a voice said. The man slammed the phone down - checking the flyer…

* * *

...Fred picked up the flyer, from the counter, and squinted at it to get a better look. 'Is this our number?' she asked, raising the leaflet so everyone could see it. The whole team scrutinised the number - and then turned to stare at Wesley.

* * *

'Are you worried?' Doyle asked Cordelia - the pair of them were wrapped up together in Cordelia's bed, supposedly drifting off to sleep.

'Yeah, you?'

'He's losin' sight of the mission.'

'He really is,' she agreed. 'I get that things are different now, but…'

'We're supposed to help the hopeless.' Doyle finished up for her. 'It isn't meant to be about the cash - or the reward. He's been down this road before - relentlessly chasin' down demon after demon without stoppin' to think about the people he was being sent to protect. As I recall, it led to him killin' a warrior on our side and havin' to do battle in front of an otherworldly tribunal to prevent a pregnant lady and her child being brutally murdered. He came back round, then - but …'

'But he's been through a lot since then.'

'We all have.'

Cordelia rolled over so she was facing her boyfriend, and kissed him. 'You can say that again. But _he_ went to a place of complete darkness. He literally flipped off the deep end. And now he has Connor, it might take him a lot more than a fight to the death to get his priorities straight, this time.'

'So what do we do?' Doyle asked.

'Keep reminding him of what's important. Don't hold back from telling him when he's lost sight of things. Make sure he knows that caring for Connor and protecting him absolutely should be his number one priority… but any ability to give him a college fund is just a perk. The mission is what matters, not the money.'

Doyle began to chuckle, and wrapped his arms tightly around his girlfriend, rolling her so she was lying on top of him. 'Cordelia Chase, I cannot believe that _you_ of all people are saying that money doesn't matter.' He kissed her.

She laughed, as well. 'Of course it _matters_ ,' she told him, 'it just isn't the most important thing - not for us. We have a mission. The mission is what matters.' She rolled back off him and then snuggled up to him, laying her head on his chest, 'we just need to make sure Angel remembers that.'

'Yeah, well - he doesn't take too kindly to bein' told what to do when it comes to the mission. I seem to remember last time he went off the rails - and you tried to talk him round - he fired the lot of us.'

'Well, this time we won't let him get that far. He might be the champion - but sometimes he is completely hopeless. And he needs us looking out for him - making the sensible decisions when he's too boneheaded to do it. So if we find that Angel can't do the right thing by the mission - for whatever reason, then we go ahead and do it for him.'

'I guess you're right.'

She smiled in the darkness. 'I always am.'

* * *

Wesley walked back into the lobby, carrying the bundle of new flyers. Gunn was leaning on the counter fixating on something. 'That's the last of them,' the watcher announced, 'six thousand new ones.' He stopped to see what it was that held Gunn's rapt attention. Across the lobby, Fred was cradling Connor in her arms. 'Adorable,' Wesley commented.

'So sweet,' Gunn agreed.

The British man glanced at him, frowning, 'I was talking about the baby.'

'I was talking about the hot mama.'

Angel walked in, then, and Wesley apologised - once again - for the mix up with the phone numbers. The vampire assured him it didn't matter, but cautioned against making a similar mistake again. 'Mistakes cost us money,' he said, 'and making money is our number one priority.'

Over at their desks, Cordelia and Doyle exchanged a significant glance. The Irishman cleared his throat, loudly. But Angel paid him no attention. Lorne had just come down the stairs and the vampire wanted to talk to him - asking him to use his own demon contacts to hunt out Holtz, seeing as how Doyle had drawn a blank. 'He's out there somewhere,' Angel said, referring to the centuries old vampire hunter, 'we can never forget that. Finding him has to be our number one priority.'

Gunn looked confused. 'I thought you said…'

'Finding him _and_ making money are our two number one priorities.'

This time it was Cordelia who cleared her throat - and Angel paid attention to _her_. 'Helping the hopeless, finding Holtz and making money are our _three_ number one priorities.'

Cordelia looked slightly mollified - but Doyle was frowning. It seemed to him suspiciously like pleasing Cordelia was Angel's actual priority. The plight of the hopeless had had no effect on the vampire when it was the half demon championing their cause. He turned back to his computer and - loathe as he was to give Angel any good news at the moment; as the vampire's attitude towards him, towards Cordy and towards the work they all did together was really starting to grate - he felt honour bound to pass along the good word. 'We've had some hits on our website,' he said. Angel came up behind him - to peer over his shoulder. Doyle tutted, as if Angel would know where to look to see their hit count!

The phone on Cordelia's desk began to ring. Wesley picked it up, 'Angel Investigations - can I help you?'

The phone on the counter began to ring and Gunn picked that one up, 'Angel Investigations - can I help you?'

From inside Wes' office, a third phone began to ring. Cordelia hurried off to answer it. Angel grinned around at the whole team. 'We're in business!'

* * *

Justine and Holtz were in the underground lair. The woman sat at a small table, whilst the vampire hunter paced up and down behind her. 'You should be thanking me,' Justine said.

'For disobeying an order?'

'For dusting two vamps.'

'Two vampires from whom I told you to walk away.' He stopped his pacing and stared at her back, 'why are you wasting my time?'

She turned her head slightly to try and look at him, 'what do you want from me?'

'Commitment,' he told her, 'we are here to discover if you have the commitment necessary for the work at hand.'

'At hand?' she snorted, 'is that a joke?'

He came over to her side, 'you must now convince me.'

She looked up at him and then back down at the table - where her hand was pinned to the surface by an awl, driven straight through her palm. She looked back up at him and he stared into her eyes, 'so - I have explained why I am doing this. Why are you?'

She tried to smile - but it was more of a grimace of pain, 'let's just say feeling something - is better than feeling nothing.'

He nodded, and told her that she was free to take the ice pick out anytime she wanted to. But if she was still in the lair when he returned, then they could move onto the next phase of her education. He turned to go - and Justine watched him leave, but stayed where she was.

* * *

The Hyperion was jostling with people - not all of them human. Even in its heyday as a glamorous Hollywood hotel - it had never seen foot traffic like this. The team members were feeling more than a little swamped. Fred took a clipboard from one of the demons who had been filling out his details for the firm, and glanced down at it. 'Well, thanks Mr. Blee - Lee - Shushngrung, just take a seat and one of our associates will be right with you.'

Angel came over to her, carrying Connor, and glanced down at the form in her hand, 'get Doyle on this one,' he advised, 'does he need a translator? Hey - Lorne!'

'Coming!' The green skinned demon had been talking to a group of demons wearing long robes and silver masks. They conversed in a strange language; made up of clicks, whirrs and popping sounds. Lorne took his leave of them and went to speak to Angel - filling him in. 'Hey, the guys with the chrome faceplates are Nahdrahs. I speak their lingo, sort of. If I understand them correctly they've got a job for our leader and a great deal of money.'

'Well, let's not keep them waiting, huh?' the vampire said, heading over.

But Lorne stopped him. 'In this case - the leader means Wesley. They saw his web articles on DNA fusion comparisons in Tri-ped demon populations.'

Angel nodded his understanding and, seeing Wesley come out of the office with a couple of people following him out, called the boss over. 'Wes, hey Wes - go speak to the Nahdrahs.'

Lorne led the British man off, and Gunn came up behind Angel - a young, blonde woman was with him. 'Is Wes' office free?' The street fighter asked, 'this is kinda personal.'

'Yeah, go.' As Gunn and the woman walked off, Angel grinned down at the baby in his arms. 'If this keeps up, little guy, we may have to incorporate, huh?'

...

Doyle was talking with the Shushngrung - the demon's English wasn't great, but Lorne was still busy with the face mask guys. 'So - you've lost your - uh - Tahvalian ascendancy locket - was it?'

'Stolen!' the Shushngrung grunted.

'Someone stole your Tahvalian ascendancy locket? What does it do?'

'Great power.'

'Uh - yeah - I figured… OK...Um - y' got any idea who might want it, who might find it useful - is there anyone that's just really pissed off at y' - any suspects at all?'

'You - detective.'

'Yeah,' Doyle sighed, 'me detective … still, an inkling as to where to look for it mightn't have been a bad start. OK - can you describe the locket for me?'

'Gold, shiny, pattern - three…' he sketched a shape in the air with his claw, 'interconnected,' he intertwined the claws of both hands to make his point, 'and vines.'

'Hang on a minute - I'm gonna get someone to draw this…' Doyle looked around for Cordelia.

...

The woman in question was sitting at the counter, speaking on the phone to yet another potential client. Angel stood close by, still holding Connor, and grinning. She held the receiver to her chest, so the client wouldn't hear, and spoke to the vampire. 'We're getting stretched pretty thin around here,' she said to him.

'Nonsense. We can handle it.'

'Really?' she arched an eyebrow at him, 'well, then why don't you handle it by picking up lines two, three, and four?'

He shrugged and picked up the nearest phone. Cordelia went back to her phone call. 'Angel Investigations, your problems are our problems,' the vampire said. He listened for a moment, 'uhuh - how urgent is it? Uhuh. And what do you do for a living?... That's a good company, you own it? OK, hold on…' he put down the receiver, 'pen, paper, quick.'

Cordelia pushed the stuff towards him, still listening to her client on the phone. She looked up, as she heard Doyle call her name. 'Cordy, darlin' - when you get a moment could y' come over here with a sketchpad?'

* * *

Gunn poured a cup of tea for the blonde woman and passed it across to her. She took it with a grateful smile, 'it's getting really bad,' she told him, 'I don't sleep, I'm afraid to go out or answer the phone.'

Gunn looked sympathetic, 'yeah, I hate stalkers. But don't worry, we'll put a stop to it. Do you know who the guy is?'

'Yes,' she admitted, 'well - it's - it's Brian, my ex-boyfriend.'

He asked her if she had been to the police. She told him she had, but that they had acted like she was a nut - like she was making it all up. Gunn nodded in sympathy: cops - wouldn't help you until somebody wound up dead.

'Somebody is dead!' the woman told him.

'Who?'

'Brian!' she showed him the company flyer, 'isn't this the sort of stuff you do? One cop… detective - a lady - said she couldn't help, officially, but she believed me. At least, I think she did. She gave me this flyer - told me to come and see you guys.'

'Detective Lockley,' Gunn surmised, 'Kate - she's good people. Well, she sent you to the right place.'

'She said you knew how to deal with this stuff - that it's what you do.'

'Yeah - we do. All the time. So - Brian, your dead boyfriend, is stalking you?'

'Well, he's not my boyfriend now!' she sniffed.

* * *

Wesley was talking to the Nahdrahs - telling them about the articles he was writing, currently. Lorne was translating. He was pretty scathing about Wes' work. 'Can we get down to business?' he asked, 'they want to buy your head. I'm a little rusty with the language - let me just clarify that.' He began to speak in the strange clicks and whirrs that the Nahdrah used. One of the demons held up a metal suitcase. Lorne smiled, 'OK - they want your mind. Their celebrating their prince's - uh - well it's like a birthday, only they're not so much born as disgorged. They need you to solve one of their traditional puzzles so they can give it to him. It's quite an honour.'

'Could be interesting,' the watcher mused.

Fred turned up beside him - and began to examine the pattern on the demons' robes. 'Sure,' she agreed with him, 'these are puzzle people. Did you notice the designs on their tunics?' She used her finger to trace the design on the nearest demon. 'Geometric shapes. Each a prime number, if you count their edges, arranged in ascending order of exponential accumulation.'

Wes smiled at her, 'Yes I did … not … notice that.'

She grinned back.

The Nahdrahs began to click at Lorne. 'Ah - they want to know why your girlfriend was pointing at them?' the green demon told him, 'I better tell them what she said before we have an international incident.' He began to click and whirr.

'Ah - she's not my…'

The Nadrahs listened to Lorne and then began to click amongst themselves, excitedly.

'Silly,' Wesley shook his head and looked embarrassed.

The demons turned and left - clicking away as they went. Fred looked at Lorne in concern. 'Did I say something wrong?' she asked.

'No, they liked _you_.'

'So much they ran away?'

Lorne gave her a reassuring smile, 'they either need to go consult with their prince … or eat a cheese monkey. Did I mention I was a little rusty on the lingo?'

...

Gunn came out of the office, 'Wes - I think I'm gonna need you on this one.'

* * *

Both Doyle and Cordy were now sitting with the Shushngrung, and Cordelia was sketching away - trying to follow the demon's hazy instructions. 'Like this?' she showed him.

'No no - more connected - in middle.'

She rubbed out the pattern and redrew it - this time making the overlap between the three irregular shapes larger. 'Here?'

'Is better - is close.'

'Right,' Doyle said, taking the sketch off his girlfriend, 'thanks, Princess. I've got a better chance of trackin' it now I know what it looks like. I'll take this and go with Mr. Blee - Lee. Have a look around, see if I can find a lead. If y' get a moment amongst all this madness - could y' maybe look the locket up in one of Wes' books? See if you can find out what it does … and who might want it?'

She looked around at the crowded lobby, 'sure.'

'Thanks - ring if y' find anythin'. I'll check in with y' when I know more.'

She gave him a swift kiss, 'be careful.'

...

Over by the phones, Angel finally hung up - picked up the piece of paper with the details - and hurried over to the sofa. He thrust Connor into Cordelia's arms. 'Oh!' she looked surprised and cast a half glance at Doyle, who didn't say anything.

'Big case - gotta run,' the vampire said to her. He started to walk out, 'I think he needs changing,' he yelled over his shoulder, 'and a bottle at three o'clock.'

Cordelia looked helplessly down at the little bundle in her arms, 'well, hi there.' She looked back up at her boyfriend. 'You OK?'

'Yeah - yeah - I'll be off, too. I know the dark avenger has just handed y' yet another ball to juggle… but if y' get a chance...'

'Of course I'll look it up,' she promised. 'I don't want you anywhere near an object of great power until we know what it does and if it can be handled safely. I'll make it my priority.'

'Thanks,' he said, again. He gave her another brief kiss - squishing the baby a little, in order to do so. Connor began to cry. Pulling away from his girlfriend, and the baby she carried, Doyle helped himself to an axe from the weapons cabinet and then left with the Shushngrung. Cordelia sighed and attempted to soothe the grisling infant.

* * *

Angel arrived at the address he had written on his piece of paper. He went up to his client's office. A man sat behind the desk, wearing a hands-free phone headset. The side wall was made entirely of glass and looked down onto a factory floor. 'Yeah, OK, that's good for us,' the man set into his headset, 'tell him a six month million dollar guarantee and we'll cover the extra costs. Yeah. No. I get that - but we need to make a decision by tomorrow. Listen - someone just walked into my office - I'll call you back.' He took the headset off and extended his hand, 'Mr. Angel?'

'It's just Angel,' the vampire said - shaking hands.

'Harlan Elster,' the man introduced himself, 'thanks for coming to meet me.' He outlined his problem. Low income housing on Eighty Third and Vermont had been turned into a nest - boarded up windows, no electricity, sewer access. 'They like it dark.'

'Vampires?' Angel asked.

A whole gang of them, Harlan told him. He showed Angel some surveillance photos. 'You got any experience dealing with vampires?'

There was a moment of quiet and then, 'some,' Angel replied, his expression blank.

'Yeah - well - not like these. They're not out for blood, they're out for money.'

'Money?'

The man began to laugh. He knew - who had ever heard of vampires out to make a quick buck? Angel said nothing. 'Anyway, they're putting the squeeze on local businessmen - setting up a protection racket. We pay them and they don't eat our employees. They want five thousand dollars by midnight.'

Angel raised his eyebrows. Harlan took out his cheque book and began to write. 'Now I'm prepared to pay ten to make this problem go away, 5 now,' he ripped out the cheque, 'and 5 when the job is done.'

'That's more than they're asking you for,' Angel pointed out.

'It isn't about the money.'

'No - right.' He took the cheque and laughed when he saw it, 'I'll get right on this.' They shook hands again and Angel left.

A moment later a door behind Harlan's desk opened. An older man walked in and looked confused to see the other man standing there. 'What are you doing here?'

'Mr. Elster,' the man said - and then he hauled back and punched the real Harlan Elster out.


	42. Provider: Part Two

Doyle stood in the chamber that the Shushngrung had brought him to. It was underground and lit by flickering torches - but it was decked out like a palace; lots of gold and silk, and a large throne standing on a dais.

Doyle whistled, 'Y'know, I used to have a place like this,' he told the demon, 'turns out I'm the Prophesied King in an alternate dimension - it was pretty snazzy. This place really reminds me o' the old throne room back in Pylea. Y' shouldda seen the getup they had me wear, though,' he whistled again, 'talk about leavin' nothin' to the imagination. I made _myself_ blush.' He eyed up all the gold glinting in the firelight, 'so I'm guessin' y' can afford to pay us good money for returning your locket to y', bud?'

'Much money - great power,' the Shushngrung grunted.

'Right,' he gave a smile that was aiming for reassuring, 'well, I'll get right on this… any other entrances, hidden passageways - that sorta thing?'

* * *

In another underground lair, Justine still sat at the table. Her head was rested on it now; she was sweating and having to fight back whimpers of pain. She heard some footsteps behind her and then Holtz appeared. He crouched down, so that their eyes were level.

'I decided to stick around,' she told him.

'You asked me what I want from you,' he wrapped his hand around the awl, 'I want you to go out and find others like you. People who have suffered as we have; people with the same rage, the same fire. You'll know them when you see them - their eyes will look - like this feels.' He ripped the ice pick from her hand and Justine screamed in agony. The vampire hunter handed her a handkerchief. 'Are we clear? Have we learned our lesson, Justine?'

Justine wrapped the handkerchief around her bleeding hand. 'We're clear.' She stood up and - as she did - she hauled back and punched him across the jaw, making him stagger backwards. 'You son of a bitch.'

* * *

Cordelia sat at Wes' desk, scanning through the books. She had Connor in the bassinet beside her, and every so often would look up and make soothing noises at him. But he wasn't her number one concern - finding out about the locket Doyle had been sent to find was. She wasn't going to risk her boyfriend going after something that might be incredibly dangerous, not without a bit of knowledge to forewarn and forearm him.

She sighed. The books were boring and she wished Wesley were here to do this, instead … he always knew where to look. They really were stretching themselves too thin - it was making them inefficient. And that worried her. Not only were they risking neglecting their mission - but they were risking their own safety, by taking on too much at once. She needed to speak to Angel again.

She sighed again, maybe she should try Ashad's Compendium Demonica… that was big, and old, and leather bound, and musty. It looked just the right sort of thing… and Wes' copy of it was in English, which was more than she could say for some of the other books she was trying to read.

Connor began to fuss, and she absentmindedly waved his teddy at him, and then went to get her book. She opened up the heavy tome and flicked to the back - looking for the index. 'T T T T…' she muttered to herself, running a finger down the list of words as she scanned for something pertinent, 'here we go; Tablets of Grehednagro, Tadeus ex, Taelif wish granters… oh, hey - here - Tahval. Yes! Page 3679.' She flicked through to the correct page and began to read.

* * *

There was only the main entrance to the underground chamber, Doyle had been told - and then one hidden passageway that led to the surface. The half demon had asked to see it, and the Shushngrung had pulled a curtain back, behind the throne - showing a bare stone wall. He pushed the large stone directly behind the centre of the throne - and the whole wall began to peel backwards, the bricks sliding apart, to reveal a cavernous, dark tunnel. There were two more Sushngrung demons inside - guarding the entrance - they wore metal helmets and carried long spears.

Doyle tried to take a step into the passageway, but the demons clanged their spears together at the tips - barring his path. He took a step backwards. 'And - uh, were the guards here when the locket was taken?' he asked.

'Asleep.' Mr. Blee - Lee told him.

'They were sleepin'? You don't have 24 hour guards?'

'Magical sleep. Knocked out.'

'OK,' The Irishman nodded, so the thief definitely came this way, then, 'did y' see anyone?' He asked the guards. But the guards did not speak English, he looked at Mr. Blee- Lee, 'what did they tell you?'

'One minute guarding, next minute - wake up. Headache. Locket gone.'

'They were knocked out cold?' He looked at how large the demons were - and the helmets they wore, it must have been something very big and very strong to over power these guys, especially without a fight. But the Shushngrung was shaking his head, 'not violence - sleep - magical.'

'You mean somethin' enchanted them?' Well… that might make these guys easier to fight, if and when Doyle tracked them down - if they weren't all musclebound. 'So what could've…would you tell the guards I need to inspect the rest o' this tunnel? Tell 'em to let me past?' The Shushngrung spoke to the armoured demons - and they released their crossed spears and stepped back - allowing Doyle entry.

The small half demon began to scan the tunnel, it was cold in there - and he was getting nothing but stale air. He switched to his demon face - to see if he could sniff out any remnants of magic. In his stronger form he was able to pick up more - not a lot, but the faint scent of a third kind of demon; not Shushngrung, and not himself. Plus there was a bitter, acrid sort of smell that hung in the air. He fancied that his red eyes could almost see it as a dust cloud, hovering in the stillness. He sniffed harder - and followed the acrid smell to where it was strongest.

On the wall, he found traces of powder - it was grainy, like sand - though he couldn't make out the colour in the gloom of the tunnel. It stuck to his fingers, and he sniffed - blanching as the unpleasant smell became over powering. But - more to the point - he also felt his eyelids grow instantly heavy. He yawned widely, and made an intense effort to knock the substance from his hands. 'OK,' he said, yawning again, 'I think we got traces of what made the guards so sleepy. Whoever took your locket must have come down the tunnel - used the powder to put the guards into their enchanted naptime, and then broken into the throne room. Where was the locket kept exactly?'

'Strong box - hidden - wall.'

'So they must've known exactly where to look for it,' Doyle mused, 'was the safe - did it show signs of a break in?'

'Door blown off.'

'Oh - right… when did you notice it was gone?'

'Last night - feast of Wi -King Sushngrung - only use throne room for feasting.'

'And how often do you have a feast? How big a time window am I looking at here?'

'Sushngrung feast every night,' the demon told him.

Doyle nodded, pleasantly surprised, 'OK - so definitely yesterday then - that's good. And it must have been stolen during the day.' He glanced upwards through the passageway, 'and y' say this leads to the surface?' he checked. The demon agreed that this was true. 'So it can't have been vampires, then,' Doyle mused. He turned to look back at his client, 'OK - I'm gonna follow this tunnel, see where it leads to - I'll be in touch when I know some more.'

...

He began to make his way through the passage, keeping his demon face on to keep him alert for any traces of previous demon activity. He kept his hands braced against the wall, either side of him - to help him keep his balance in the darkness. The stones were smooth beneath his fingertips but, as he reached the end, he suddenly felt his left hand plunge into some deep gouges in the wall. 'Huh,' he stopped to examine them. They were claw marks - seven of them - scratched deep into the stony surface. 'Magic demons with seven fingers,' he said to himself, 'that oughta narrow it down, some.'

...

As he stepped out of the tunnel - and onto the street - he found himself in the familiar environs of Korea Town. His cell began to ring and - as he glanced at it - he realised he had missed several calls from Cordelia - he mustn't have had signal underground.

'Yello, Princess - I wasn't ignorin' y', I've had no signal - did y' find anythin'?'

'You bet your butt, I have,' she responded, 'This Locket - big mojo - you need to be super careful. I'm guessing whoever took it is gonna be quite happy to kill to keep it.'

'I got my axe,' he reassured her, 'so what do we know?'

'About 500 years ago there was this uberlord demon king - Tahval - he made the locket.'

'And what does it do?'

'Well, it's an ascendancy locket. In terms of those silly video games you play with Gunn, it lets you level up, essentially.'

'How?' He didn't understand, and he wrinkled his brow as he listened to her.

'When he was dying, Tahval wanted to make sure that his daughter would continue to rule in his place,' she told him, 'he didn't have a son - and he was worried the other demons might overthrow a queen. But he was determined his bloodline would stay in control. So he trapped his essence into the locket. Tahval was able to absorb the powers of other demons. When the locket is opened - his essence bursts out, like a bright light and kind of… melts whoever is looking at it. Then their power gets absorbed into whoever wielded the locket.'

'So if y' have this locket, you can kill any kind of demon and absorb all the powers that they had?' Doyle asked, 'makin' you superhero concentrate?'

'Super villain more like,' Cordy replied.

Doyle smiled, 'right, thanks a lot, Princess - listen. Whoever took this thing took it yesterday, during the daytime. It was hidden - but they seemed to know exactly where to find it. They used a magic powder to knock out the guards, and they got seven claws. Can y' look on the demon database to see if y' can find anything that fits?'

'Sure thing, what are you gonna do?'

Doyle eyed the apothecary across the road, 'I'm gonna ask around Korea Town, see if anyone, or anythin's, been buyin' magic sleepin' powder.'

* * *

When Angel returned to the hotel, the lobby was deserted - except for Fred who was flopped down on the sofa beside Connor's bassinet. Cordelia was at her desk, searching the demons demons demons database.

'Is this a great country or what?' the vampire asked, 'five thousand smackeroos - and all I have to do to get five thousand more is clean out a vamp nest Downtown.' He looked around, 'where are the guys? I wanna show them this.'

'Out on cases,' Cordelia said, taking a sip of her coffee, and not looking up from her computer.

'There's a young woman whose dead boyfriend is stalking her,' Fred supplied.

'Oh that's terrible - is she…'

'I ran a credit check,' Cordelia told him, 'she's solvent.' She rolled her eyes at the vampire's greed, and then tapped some more words into the search bar - hoping to narrow her parameters.

Angel crouched down by the crib and tickled his son, 'how's my little magnum cum laude?' he asked, 'Notre Dame - class of 2020.'

Cordelia rolled her eyes again - and once more raised her objections to the number of cases they were working. 'What if we're all out working?' she asked, 'and some poor devil stumbles in here needing our help?'

The door opened, at that moment, and Lorne came stumbling in - giggling. Angel glared at him, 'you've been drinking?'

Lorne giggled harder - no - he could hold his liquor, but the same could not be said for his fire water. He'd been using it to loosen the tongue of his Gar-wak snitch to find out about Holtz.

'And?' Angel demanded.

'He really doesn't like you!' the green demon swayed on the spot. 'I'm led to believe that he and his Grapplar demons had plans to …' he made a slicing motion across his throat, accompanied with a violent sound effect. Angel nodded - Holtz was using the Grapplars as soldiers. But Lorne corrected him - not any more, he wasn't. Word was he had poisoned them and was now looking for replacements - humans.

'Do we know where he is?' Angel asked.

'Bro, I'm on it. I've got rats looking all over this town. Well, not actual rats - except two of them. Ooh, I don't feel so good.' He sank down onto the sofa - just as the doors opened once more, and this time the Nahdrahs walked in. They were clicking and popping away. 'These are the guys that wanted Wesley,' Angel remembered.

Lorne listened to the strange noises of the Nahdrah language. 'Not anymore,' he said, 'now they want Fred.'

'What for?'

'Her enormous brain. They're convinced she can solve the puzzle they wanna give to their prince.' He looked at the woman in question, 'they weren't offended before, they were impressed.' Fred looked pleased. But Angel wanted to know where she would have to go - and how long it would take. A few clicks later and Lorne came back with the answer. The Nahdrah lived on a barge, docked in the marina - and it should take a day or two. It would depend how quickly Fred could solve the puzzle.

'You game?' Angel asked Fred.

She shrugged. 'Sure.'

He turned back to Lorne, 'you'll have to go with her to translate. Tell 'em it won't be cheap. They're getting two of our top employees. That's salary per diem, plus overtime.'

There was a bit more clicking and whirring between the Nahdrahs and the anagogic demon. One of them held up the metal suitcase from before and then Lorne began to translate for his English speaking companions. 'They apologise for their paltry offering and hope you'll accept …' The Nahdrah opened the suitcase to show bundles of cash all stacked up inside, it clicked. 'Fifty thousand dollars!?' Lorne finished, incredulously.

Even Cordelia looked up from her computer at that. Angel and Fred stared down at the money and then ..' we accept,' the vampire said.

* * *

Wes and Gunn were at the blonde woman's house - standing guard. The woman was talking, telling them how upsetting all this had been - how hard it was to ask for help. 'You know that woman was right,' she said, 'you do inspire confidence.'

'Detective Lockley?' Gunn asked, wrinkling his brow.

But the woman shook her head, 'no - not the cop - someone at your place. Brunette - really cute … Texan maybe?'

'Fred.' Both men spoke in unison, matching dreamy smiles on their faces. Then they caught each other at it - and glared.

'Said I inspire confidence,' Gunn repeated.

'Actually - I - I believe that was aimed at me,' Wesley protested.

'Really? 'Cause I don't think so...'

But their argument was cut off by the woman finding a picture of her dead boyfriend, Brian - and showing it to them. 'Not exactly a rocket scientist,' she admitted, 'but he was so sweet. You ever just meet someone and everything feels…'

'Comfortable,' both men finished - again with the dreamy smiles. They glared at each other once more. 'You read all the same science journals,' Wesley said.

'You laugh at the same dumb jokes,' countered Gunn.

'And the sex,' the woman continued, not listening to the argument, 'God I miss the sex.'

'Tell me about it,' Gunn muttered to himself.

'But there's something I don't understand,' she said to them … she wanted an explanation. How could Brian be stalking her, if he was dead?

Wesley came up with any number of different ways such a thing might be possible; voodoo, witchcraft, black magic, zombiefication, demon possession - even vampirism. The woman nodded - but that still didn't explain _why_ he was haunting her.

'Perhaps there is something he left unfinished,' Wesley said to her, 'something he wants to tell you.'

'Or maybe he just wants to eat your intestines,' Gunn suggested. That made Wesley tut. They didn't know they were dealing with a zombie - and besides, the whole flesh eating thing was a myth. Zombies would only mangle, mutilate, and occasionally wear human flesh - so there was no reason to be worried until they had a better idea.

At thar moment, the door beside Wesley cracked open and a pale hand appeared, reaching through. The watcher threw himself against the door, trying to force it shut. 'Gunn!' The street fighter appeared at his side, with a baseball bat - and began to beat any part of Brian that was visible. The dead man backed away - and they slammed the door shut. 'Right then,' Wesley said, 'zombie it is.'

* * *

Lorne and Fred followed the Nahdrahs onto the barge - Lorne feeling a little the worse for wear from his fire water session. As they stepped on board, the demons took a picture of the couple - and then showed them through to the room where the puzzle was laid out. Irregular hunks of glass, which glowed softly from the inside, were lying on the table. 'This is the puzzle they want you to solve,' Lorne said.

The woman looked at the shapes. 'I'm guessing they fit together in some sort of algorithmic sequence?' she looked back at the demons, 'any hints?' Lorne translated for her - and then explained the only clue they could give was that if they knew how to do it themselves, she wouldn't be there.

Fred sighed and sat down on the floor, by the table. She opened her laptop and picked up the shards of glass to get a better look at them. 'So,' she breathed, 'causation, corollary, are we talking a closed curve of finite length in a simply connected domain of zero? That would be too easy, wouldn't it?'

One of the Nahdrahs came over with a silver tray and offered hors d'oeuvres to their guests. Lorne was about to accept - when he noticed what they were. 'Oh I couldn't possibly,' he said, 'I had eyeballs and insects for breakfast.'

* * *

Angel walked into the vampire's lair and looked around. It was dank and squalid and gloomy. It must have been a miserable enough place back when it was low rent housing for the living - but, now they had cleared out and left it as a haunt for the undead, it was truly falling apart. He found a table that had various objects scattered across it - clearly taken from their victims; watches, wallets, jewellery. If they were in this for the money - then they clearly weren't doing anything worthwhile with their prizes. This place was a serious dive - even if he were evil, Angel would be ashamed to hang out here. Some vampires just had no class.

He pulled out a stake and flattened himself against the wall, as he heard the sounds of footsteps approaching. A vampire walked in, carrying more loot - and Angel jumped him from behind. The vampire span and hit its assailant. Angel punched him back in kind. The vampire kicked out at him and Angel did likewise. Once it had regained its balance, it launched itself at Angel, throwing him to the floor. Angel crashed through a table, and landed next to the table leg. He seized it. 'Next time you hit the yard sales,' he said, flipping to his feet, 'you may wanna lay off the wooden furniture.' He plunged the makeshift stake into the vampire's heart and watched it turn to dust. 'I hear wicker is nice.'

He turned around - and saw two more vamps standing there. 'Oh great,' he said, sounding weary.

One of the vampires grinned, as they looked him up and down, 'dibs on the coat,' it said.

* * *

Angel walked back into Harlan Elster's office, looking a little battered and bruised - and pulled up short when he saw an unfamiliar man staring at him. 'What are you doing here?' the man asked.

'I-I am looking for Harlan Elster,' the vampire's voice was uncertain.

'I'm Harlan Elster,' the unfamiliar man told him.

Angel felt his heart sink. 'That's bad,' he said.

'Why is it bad?'

'Because the Harlan Elster I'm looking for,' he pulled the cheque for five thousand dollars out of his coat pocket, 'gave me this.'

The real Harlan took the cheque from it, and looked at it. Then he pointed to his chin. 'Well he gave me this,' he said, referring to the bruise that was blossoming there. 'At least mine's real.' He handed the cheque back. 'The man who forged my name,' he said, 'about your height, less beat up?'

Angel agreed that yes, that was him.

'Sam Ryan,' Harlan told him, 'used to work for me. Press foreman. Fired him six months ago. He kept coming to me to bankroll his kooky scheme.'

'Kooky scheme?' Angel asked.

Elster outlined the plan as Sam Ryan had seen it. He had wanted to hire some charlatan ghostbuster to clear out an abandoned rathole in midtown. The guy had been off his nut ever since he had lost his boyfriend - and was convinced that there were _vampires_ nesting in this building. 'Some people would take advantage of a guy like that,' he said.

'Yeah,' Angel agreed, sadly, 'yeah.' He ripped his cheque in two - and began to walk away.

Behind him Harlan chuckled. 'Immortal creatures living in a rat infested building, guarding their treasure. _Right_.'

Already halfway out of the door, Angel stopped - at his words - and turned back. 'Treasure?' he asked.

* * *

Doyle trudged through the streets. He had hit 3 apothecaries, and the magic store, and 4 of the 5 herbalist shops and the demon massage parlour. He'd got nothing. He could only hope that Cordelia was having more success identifying his seven clawed robber demons - because he was running out of ideas. If this next shop hadn't sold any enchanted sleeping powder recently, he wasn't sure where he could turn. Merl would have been good for this sort of thing - would've heard if any group or clan had recently acquired an invaluable artefact… or started trading up power wise.

But Merl was long dead - Kizzie too - their insides painted on the walls of their homes. And Doyle was left having to do the leg work himself. Maybe if the next shop didn't pay off he could hit a demon bar. Shame Caritas was gone, now - but he could visit another - listen out for any info. He didn't really want to, though. If he was going to spend any length of time in a bar - and who knew how long it would take to get the skinny on these demons? - then he would have to buy a drink. And he didn't trust himself right now. One drink would turn into two, and then three or four. He'd be drinking on the job - getting ever more maudlin - and ever less likely to pick up any gossip. He'd end up letting the team down… and he would disappoint Cordelia.

He arrived at the final herbalist shop. He really hoped he got lucky this time.

* * *

Fred worked away at the puzzle. It seemed to be coming together - and it was fascinating. 'There is an ascending and descending causation immediately proved by…' all the pieces stacked together, 'that!' She grinned up at Lorne, 'I think I'm onto something here,' she told him.

'Me too,' he replied, 'unfortunately it requires a vomitorium.' He clicked at the Nahdrah, who clicked back and pointed. Lorne excused himself to go use the facilities - and Fred turned back to her puzzle. She slid another glass piece into place - and, on seeing that, the Nahdrah hurried away.

...

As Lorne came to the top of the stairs, and began to walk down the gangway, he heard the clicks and whirrs of the Nahdrah language coming from the other end. He turned back so he could listen in. He found the sound coming from an alcove, which had been curtained off. Parting the curtain so he could see, he peered through into the room where the demons were talking.

There was a Nahdrah sitting on a throne. It was not wearing a mask and it looked very sick. Several other demons were attending to it. One of them had a laptop - and it was showing the screen to the sick looking Nahdrah. It was the photo of Fred that they has taken when the two team members had first arrived on the boat.

The demon clicked, and her head slid from her body and then slid onto a photo of the body of the sick looking Nahdrah. 'She is solving the puzzle sire,' the demon was saying, 'we have found a head worthy of sitting upon your noble shoulders.'

The sick Nahdrah prince began to nod. And Lorne turned away, letting the curtain drop. But, as he stepped away from the alcove, he was hit on the head from behind by a metal bar - and collapsed.

'We will sew it on this very night,' he heard the demon say, before he lost consciousness.


	43. Provider: Part Three

Cordelia looked up and glanced over at Connor, wrinkling her nose - she had once more been left in charge of him. 'Whoo-ee,' she said, 'someone needs a change.' She picked him up and took him over to his changing mat, laying him down and gently unfastening the poppers on his babygro. 'We need to talk to daddy again about everyone being out all at once - Holtz could come through that door any minute, not to mention one of our hopeless types. And what's your Auntie Cordelia meant to do about it?'

She took his nappy off and began to clean him up, 'not to mention - your Uncle Doyle isn't crazy about the idea of me caring for you. He doesn't hate you, you know, he's a good man, he couldn't hate a baby. But you're a symbol, yes you are, of what he and I can't have together, and it makes him grouchy. Not that daddy should be able to have you either - no he shouldn't. He's a vampire,' She began to put the fresh nappy on him. 'But he's a good man, too. He's a champion, and he loves you very very much. Plus he's quite the natty dresser.'

Change complete, she picked him up, jigged him a few times until he gurgled with pleasure - and then placed him back in the bassinet. 'And right now your daddy, and your Uncle Doyle - and all your other uncles, plus Auntie Fred are out fighting evil - for money.' She dropped the soiled diaper in the trash, and then squirted on some hand sanitiser, 'and I have to get back to work identifying which nasty demons stole a nice demon's locket, yes I do.' She tickled his feet, and then sat back down at the computer.

Whilst she had been away, the database had come up with a hit. 'Oh great,' she said, then she peered at the picture, 'oh gross! I'd rather you than me, Doyle,' and she picked up the phone to ring her boyfriend.

* * *

' _Gamsa,_ ' Doyle nodded a little head bow of thanks to the old lady behind the counter, ' _gomowoyo._ ' One of the many things he'd picked up over the years working with Angel was a smattering of Korean. He didn't know that he got the exact right words, or pronounced them correctly, but she seemed to understand - and beamed her pleasure at him attempting to speak her language.

' _Cheonman-eyo,'_ she said, and he nodded again and backed out of her store.

She had sold some sleeping powder: _agma sumyeonje_ to a person in long robes - with very pale skin and a suspicious amount of fingers - three days ago. And she had very kindly handed over her copy of the receipt to Doyle. They hadn't paid by cash - the half demon had an address.

His phone rang, it was Cordelia, 'Hey, Princess - I know where I'm goin', now,' he told her, cheerfully.

'That's good,' she said to him, 'because I think I know what you're looking for.'

He listened carefully as she described the demons that she had found. 'They're called the Taojin zhe,' she said, 'Asian in origin - they're creepy little dudes. Short. Completely white skinned and wrinkly, with big bulbous heads.'

'And seven sharp claws on each hand?' He checked with her.

'Bingo,' she said, 'they're gold finders - they can sniff it out.'

'Explains how they knew where to look in the throne room… though that place certainly didn't scrimp on the gold.'

'Yeah - well - they're like magpies - always out searching for valuable treasure.'

'Like Angel right now?'

She snorted, 'even worse. They're not big with the fighting - they're undersized and undermuscled,' she giggled, 'kinda like you.'

'Hey!'

She became serious again, 'but if they have the locket…'

'Then they could have stolen the power of a much stronger demon already.'

'Yeah - and they might try to steal your powers from you - such as they are. Be careful, Doyle. Even without the locket - those claws look nasty. I'm pretty sure you'll need a tetanus if they scratch you - that is, if you're insides don't fall out.'

'I'll be careful - The address is in Chinatown if y' need me - just off the central plaza. I'll let y' know when I'm done.'

'OK - love you.'

'Love you too, Princess.' he hung up - and began the long journey between the two Asian districts.

* * *

Sam Ryan walked into the vampire's nest. It was all quiet, now - and he walked slowly through the rooms until he found what he was looking for. He picked the watch up from the dresser and turned it over in his hands, his eyes blurring with tears. Then Angel grabbed him from behind and took it. 'Give it back!' Sam cried.

'No - I think I earned it,' Angel told him, 'what is it? Rolex?'

'Timex.'

'Oh,' he twisted Sam's arm even harder, 'we both know it's not just a watch. Probably worth a lot more than ten grand too.'

'A lot more,' Sam agreed.

'So what can it do?' the vampire wanted to know. He began to hazard a guess - open a portal maybe, or summon an army?

'It glows in the dark,' Sam admitted, 'probably all it does now. Looks like they cracked it when they took it off him.' Angel let go of him, and the man turned to face him. 'I told him to just let them have it,' his voice was heartbroken - as he recounted the bitter memory, 'but - he wasn't about to give it up. It was the first thing I ever bought for him.'

'The vampires killed your boyfriend?' Angel said.

Sam nodded - he was sorry, but he had needed help and he didn't know what else to do.

'I didn't kill three vampires for nothing,' Angel told him - unmoved by the man's plight. 'Ten grand, that was the deal.' Pro bono dustings were not gonna put Connor through college.

'Seven,' Sam said.

Angel nodded reluctantly, 'OK - I'll take seven.'

But that wasn't what the man had meant. He wasn't naming a price - he was naming the number of vampires. There had been seven. They both looked at each other. 'Which would mean there are four more,' Angel said.

'Four more,' Sam agreed.

* * *

Doyle arrived at the address - a backstreet just off the central plaza of Chinatown. Although it was a back alley, the buildings were still the traditional Chinese style and the street was festooned with paper lanterns. He found the correct building, according to the receipt the elderly Korean lady had given him. Cautiously, he pushed the door open and went inside. It was a warehouse and it smelled fusty and abandoned. The boarded up windows added to that effect. There didn't seem to be anyone around. He flicked on his flashlight and began to search the place.

There were stacks of crates piled high to the ceiling - but no gold finder demons - or even any gold. 'Well, this is a bust,' he said to himself and exhaled slowly, wondering what Angel would do now. He shone his flashlight around a bit more, it fell on an expensive looking oriental rug lying on the floor. Well, he didn't know what Angel would do - but he knew Cordy would be making some comment about how the rug hardly matched the rest of the decor. An idea hit him, and he kicked the carpet out of the way.

Sure enough, there was a trapdoor underneath. He eased it open - a flight of stairs led to a basement, and he crept downwards. He felt his jaw drop, as he looked around this underground room: gold. It was swimming with it - all twinkly and sparkly - statues, jewellery, even furniture all piled up around the chamber like the lost treasure trove of Tutankhamun. 'Yep,' Doyle said to himself, 'this is the place.'

He began to make his way over to a golden table laden with golden necklaces - hoping one would match the picture Cordelia had drawn for him - when he felt a sudden twinge in his head. 'Right now?' he groaned, 'oh man!' And then fell to the floor as the onslaught of the vision pain washed over him. He saw flashes of images: _Fred with the puzzle pieces, the sick prince, the laptop - and the picture on the screen - and then a large knife aimed at Fred's neck._

As the pictures in his mind began to fade, along with the pain, he pushed himself up into a sitting position, 'Oh God, Fred, love,' he mumbled, 'whatever it is you're doin', darlin' - y' need to stop _right now_.'

* * *

Fred placed another piece of glass on top of the ones she had already stacked. It slid in perfectly, stuck to its glowing brethren. She smiled up at the Nahdrah, who stood beside her, watching. 'Shouldn't be long, now,' she told him.

* * *

Wesley and Gunn and the woman were secured tight inside her living room. She looked at her watch. 'Do you know how much longer this is gonna take?' she asked, 'I have plans tonight.'

'We've taken every precaution,' Wesley told her, 'secured every entrance...'

There was the sound of glass smashing in the kitchen. 'Except maybe the skylight in the kitchen,' Gunn said.

Brian burst through the living room door, 'Ally!' he cried at the woman, 'Ally baby! I just...'

Gunn hit him over the head with his baseball bat. Ally flinched. Brian collapsed. And the three living occupants of the room fled into the bedroom. Brian got up, and tried to push the men away to reach his ex girlfriend, but Gunn smacked him over the head again. He stumbled back into the living room - and Wesley slammed the bedroom door shut.

* * *

'You know, Connor,' Cordelia said, peering down into the bassinet, 'you're gonna learn there are a lot of cool things in this world: true love; designer shoes; champagne cocktails on the beach at sunset… but you know what's way up on the list?' She showed him a handful of cash from the metal suitcase, 'fifty thousand dollars - that can buy a lot of the other good stuff.' She beamed her biggest, brightest smile. 'Not love, though,' she admitted, 'turns out love comes in the most badly dressed and penniless of forms… that one takes a while to learn. But it's totally worth it when you get there.'

The phone began to ring - and she hurried to pick it up, 'Angel Investigations, we help the help…'

'Princess, it's me.'

'Doyle - did you get it?'

'No - listen - I had a vision. It's Fred. She's in big trouble.'

Cordelia frowned, 'I don't understand - she went down to the Marina with Lorne to solve a puzzle for some demons.'

'Yeah - well - when she solves the puzzle they're gonna cut her head off. And - I think - sew it on to someone else's body.'

'I've been there,' Cordelia said - thinking back to her high school days. 'What do we do?'

'I'm gonna head to the Marina right now - the locket can wait. Get in touch with the others for me and send them along too.'

'Will do,' she said, 'be careful.'

'That's like the fifth time you've said that today - I always am.'

She heard his phone hang up, and she immediately replaced the receiver and began to dial Wes.

* * *

Doyle put his cell back in his pocket and began to head back to the stairs. He heard a noise behind him. A demon was there - short and crooked backed, with shining white skin and long vicious looking claws. A Taojin zhe. He heard a noise from the other direction - and glanced over his shoulder. It was another one. And then another and another. They melted out of the shadows and began to surround him. 'Uh - listen - guys…' he said, he chuckled drily, 'I know this is gonna sound weird - as it was me that came here and all - but could we maybe take a raincheck? Somethin' real important just came up.'

The first demon let out long, undulating, eldritch wail and then launched himself at the Irishman; knocking him off his feet. 'I'll take that as a no,' Doyle sighed.

* * *

Cordelia put the phone down, again, and peered back into the bassinet. 'OK,' she said. 'Your Uncles Wesley and Gunn aren't answering their phones, right now. And you're daddy doesn't know how to use his voicemail. I'm not leaving Uncle Doyle to fight all these demons and save Auntie Fred all by himself. So we're just gonna take this money down to the Marina - and explain to the demons that this has all been a big misunderstanding.'

She picked up Connor and cradled him in one arm. Then she used her free hand to pick up the metal suitcase of cash - and the two of them hurried out of the Hyperion.

* * *

Gunn and Wesley heaved a dresser in front of the bedroom door, as Brian pounded on it. 'Ally why won't you talk to me?'

'Because you're dead!' she yelled back, 'now go away.' She looked over at the two men. 'You know I'm paying good money here. Could you please get rid of him?'

They braced themselves against the dresser - but it was no good. Brian pushed and pushed from the other side, and was able to shove hard enough that a crack in the door appeared. The zombie poked his head through. 'Just give me another chance, baby!' he pleaded. He glanced between Wesley and Gunn, 'who the hell are these guys?'

'We're here to protect her from you, actually,' Wesley admitted - giving up on bracing the dresser.

Brian grinned with relief, 'protection?' He looked back to his ex girlfriend, 'I thought you were dating them.'

'You know - this is exactly why I broke up with you,' she said to him, 'you're suffocating me.' She joined the men at the door and they began to push again. Gunn whacked Brian over the head with his baseball bat once again and, once the zombie had stumbled backwards, they slammed the door shut on him.

They all waited for a moment. Nothing happened. Wesley slid the dresser back and Gunn took a peek out into the living room.'What's he doing?' the watcher whispered.

'He's … pouting.'

'OK - that's it,' Ally marched past the men, out into the living room and accosted her dead boyfriend. This was just so typical of him - all this bluster... and then he'd pout.

Brian stuck out his bottom lip and looked sad, 'I thought we had fun together,' he said, in a sulky tone of voice.

'We did,' she sighed, 'but you were just so needy.'

'Needy - because I cared?'

But Ally wasn't taking that. Caring didn't give him the right to read her diary or follow her to work.

'I never…' the zombie protested, 'well - OK - I read your diary once or twice… but did you really have to poison me?'

Wes and Gunn stared at her in disbelief. She tried to laugh it off - a choked, disparaging chuckle. 'You're not gonna believe something that a _zombie_ says, are you?' she asked them.

'Are you saying _she_ killed you?' Wesley asked the zombie.

'I'd forgive her if she'd only take me back.' He turned to Ally and began to plead with her. He'd seen the guys she'd been out with since she'd killed him. They weren't making her happy - she wasn't having any fun. He asked for another chance - that they give it another shot. Ally stayed silent, and he got to his feet, smiling. 'What do you say, me and you?'

'No' she protested, 'it's creepy.'

'Come on - I miss you.'

Gunn shook his head, in disbelief, as Ally began to smile, as well. 'Well - maybe I was a little hasty,' she said. They hugged - and the two team members shook their heads at each other. The couple were now kissing.

'Will that be cash or charge?' Wesley asked.

* * *

Sam had his back braced against the door, as the vampires pounded on it from the outside. Angel sat across the room, watching him. If he wasn't going to get paid - then he wasn't going to fight. But Sam couldn't hold it by himself - the demons were going to break through. Angel agreed that was likely, and Sam threw him a disbelieving look. Angel sighed, 'alright - you know what? I'll help barricade - but that's all.' He got up and went to stand beside the man - also bracing his back against the door.

'I'm sorry I lied to you,' Sam said to him, 'I shouldn't have.'

'No - you did the wrong thing,' the vampire agreed, 'but for the right reasons. Your motives were noble.' He began to ruminate. It wasn't like he'd never been accused of nobility himself.

'Then you understand,' Sam said.

'Yeah - but being a champion isn't all good deeds and happy endings. There's a lot that goes on behind the scenes. People don't always seem to consider that.' The pounding on the door became even heavier - and the two men could feel the wood begin to give way beneath the onslaught.

'I - I think we're in real trouble here,' Sam said, closing his eyes, as the vibrations of the door slamming ran through his body.

'All right,' Angel said, 'maybe we can figure something out. You own a car?'

But the bank owned it.,

'A house?'

He rented.

'How's your credit, can you borrow?'

But Sam was between jobs. He had spent all his time and money chasing down these guys.

Angel shook his head. 'I don't know what to tell you, Sam. I can't kill on deferment. It sets a precedent.'

* * *

Doyle morphed into his demon face and used his extra strength to kick the Taojin zhe off himself. He rolled over and scrambled to his feet - swinging his axe at the first demon that rushed him. He got lucky - and the demon's head flew off his shoulders and bounced along the floor. The other demon's wailed in anger and two of them ran at him at once. He kicked one back and then swung his axe at the second. It ducked and the axe swung harmlessly over its head. But Doyle righted himself and, when the Taojin zhe straightened back up, he headbutted it full in the face. His spikes gouged into its skin and it fell back - clutching its face and yowling in pain.

He turned back to fight the first demon who had attacked him. But the demon wasn't rushing him, again. Instead it was fiddling with something under it's robes. It pulled something gold out from beneath them - wrapped around its neck. 'Oh hey - the locket!' Doyle said, elbowing one of the other demons in the face as it came for him again.

The first demon began to struggle with the clasp that held the locket shut. 'Uh - man - y' might not wanna do that,' the Irishman said - remembering what Cordelia had told him about the essence of Tahval. But the demon paid him no heed - perhaps it didn't understand English - and with a triumphant squawk it ripped open the locket - exposing the insides.

'No!' Doyle yelled and closed his eyes, covering his entire head with his arms. Even protecting himself, he could still feel the intensity of the bright light scorching against his body. And then he could hear the eldritch screaming of the demons - followed by a popping sound. Then all was quiet - and the heat died away.

Doyle risked a look, peeking out from between his hands. The two other demons had seemingly vanished… until he looked at the floor and saw puddles of white gloopy nastiness. He blanched. They had been melted by the light.

He looked at the final demon - the one who had wielded the locket - who stared at his liquefied brethren in surprise. 'You're really not that bright, are you?' Doyle asked, 'or maybe y' didn't know what it did? Kinda makes me feel bad to do this -' he swung his axe again, and lopped off the final Taojin zhe's head. Its body fell to the floor, and the half demon snatched the locket from around its neck stump, closed it up, and pocketed it. 'I'd help myself to more of your treasures,' he told the headless corpse, 'but I got an emergency that I really need to be gettin' to.' And he ran back up the stairs and out of the building; hailed a cab, and told it to take him to the Marina.

* * *

Fred slid the last piece into place. The glass shapes now formed a pyramid - and the soft glow from inside began to increase in intensity - becoming a bright white light. The demons watching her began to click in excitement. She took her glasses off and smiled, her grin was wide and proud.

'Oh, it was nothing,' she told them, as she got to her feet. They took hold of her arms and began to pull her along towards the gangway. 'Are we going somewhere to celebrate?' she asked. 'Has anyone seen my friend with the horns?' she asked as they towed her along, 'he wasn't feeling so good and I'm starting to worry about him.'

They led her through the curtains into the alcove - and she saw Lorne tied up on the floor, 'and me now,' she gulped.

'Yeah, I know,' Lorne said to her, 'we're in a bit of a situation. here.'

The Nadrah pulled her across the room, and forced her into a chair - opposite the dying prince. They fastened some clamps to her, so she couldn't get up. 'Oh god,' she cried - looking at the hideous wrinkly demon prince, all liverspotted and drooling. 'I don't have to marry him do I?'

'In fact, no,' Lorne told her, 'and that's something we can be grateful for.'

'What are they gonna do?'

'Well - uh…' He really didn't want to have to tell her this, 'it seems like the prince's head - or heads - well, they - uh - wear out, every so often and they…'

'Cut off someone else's and give him a new one?' Her voice had gone up several octaves in fear. A Nadrah approached her, carrying the large blade, and she stared at the knife in horror. 'Lorne! Help! help!' But, tied up on the floor, there was nothing he could do,

_Phewwoo!_ A loud wolf whistle cut through the alcove, and everyone turned to stare at the curtains - where Cordelia was standing, Connor in one hand - the suitcase of money in the other. 'Hey! I'd just like a word here,' she said.

Lorne began to chuckle, and glanced up at the Nahdrah, 'Oh-ho-ho, you guys are so gonna get your butts kicked.'

'Lorne!'

'I'm sorry,' he said, 'I yield the floor to the person _not_ tied up on it.'

'I need you to translate for me,' Cordelia said. 'There's been a terrible misunderstanding,' she directed her words at the Nahdrahs, 'and I know you're men of honour. And I know we can make a simple exchange. In - a - civilised manner.' She looked at Lorne who began to click away - and then she set down the suitcase. 'We return your gracious gift, and you return Fred. Sorry about the confusion - but we kind of need her head at work.'

'Firmly attached to her body!' Fred added from her place in the chair.

'That goes without saying.' She looked at Lorne, 'say it!'

He began to click and whirr again. And the demons clicked back - and then raised their weapons looking angry. 'I told them what they had to do,' he said, smugly, 'and told them what would happen if they didn't do it.'

Cordelia exhaled, and smiled nervously. She jigged Connor up and down. 'Lorne - we're in no position to be threatening these nice people,' she said through gritted teeth, her smile held firmly in place and aimed at the Nahdrah.

'Sure we are!' Lorne said, happily, 'Angel and the guys can take 'em,' he craned his neck, 'Can't see them from down here. Where are they, anyway?'

'Out making money.' Her teeth were still gritted.

'Oh - so when I told the Nahdrah they were surrounded by killer warriors, I was stretching the truth just a little?'

'Just enough to get us killed,' Cordelia told him, and she breathed a nervous laugh and smiled her widest smile at the demons, in an attempt to placate them.


	44. Provider: Part Four

The vampires continued to pound - and Angel made a decision. He stepped away from the door. Sam stared after him, 'uh, yeah, hello? What happened to the complimentary barricading?'

'It's gonna give,' Angel replied, picking up a chair and tossing it at the window high up in the wall. 'I'm gonna get you out of here. Let's go.'

The man closed his eyes for a moment as he contemplated the possibility of escape. Then - 'no, you go.'

'What?'

'I'm not leaving,' Sam said, 'I can't.'

Angel was incredulous - this man couldn't seriously believe he could take on four vampires all by himself?

'Probably not,' Sam agreed, 'but these things killed Jack. If I run now, I'll be running the rest of my life.'

Angel contemplated him, he rubbed his eyes, blearily. 'Yeah - that's noble,' he said, 'but do you think it's what Jack would want?'

'No, I think Jack would want to be here with me. But that's never gonna happen.' He was still braced against the door - but it was moving violently behind him, and would collapse any moment.

Angel sighed, broke the leg of the chair and then pulled Sam away from the door. 'You take on a job in good faith,' he said to the man, 'you expect to be compensated. You provide the best service you can offer.' The door burst open, behind him, and he used the leg of the chair to stake the first vampire, without even turning around. Then he threw another one to the side. He kept his eyes on Sam the whole time. 'A quality service - but you know, there's overheads.'

The final vampire hesitated in the doorway as Angel staked another, again seemingly without any effort. In fact, all his concentration seemed to be focused on his own personal rant. 'There's rent, three phone lines, advertising. It adds up.' The remaining vampires began to run away, and Angel pulled the watch out of his pocket and threw it at Sam, 'here.' He started to walk away.

'Thank you,' Sam called after him, 'I can't even begin to express my…'

Angel ignored him and threw the makeshift stake to one side as he stalked off.

'You're a real champion,' Sam yelled after his retreating back. 'I owe you.'

'Yeah - whatever -' In the quiet that followed the fight, Angel became aware of a beeping noise and realised it was coming from his phone. He fished it out and held it to his ear. 'Hello?' the beeping continued. He took the cell from his ear, gave it a shake and tried again, 'hello?' It continued to beep.

'Hey-' Sam called to him , 'I think - I think that's your voicemail.'

* * *

'Lorne - do these guys have groins?' Cordelia glanced away from the angry, weapon wielding Nahdrah to look down at the prone anagogic demon.

'Is that really important right now?' Fred squealed - still straining against the clamps that held her in place.

'Work with me here, kids,' Cordelia replied.

'I think so,' Lorne frowned, 'I never knew one intimately.'

At his words, Cordelia took a step forward - lifted her leg, putting all the power into it she could - and booted the nearest demon between the legs. There was a loud metal clanging noise, and Cordelia hopped away on one foot, 'oh, ow ow ow ow!'

She hopped all the way back through the curtains - it billowed with the disturbance - and then fell still. Then it rippled again - and Cordelia re-emerged - but this time, she was flanked by Wes and Gunn, their weapons raised, their faces determined. They launched themselves towards the group of Nahdrah - swinging their weapons - getting knocked to the ground, and continuing to brawl from down there. They were soon swamped by a pile of silver-masked demons, and all Cordy could see of them was their baseball bats swinging out.

She danced on the sidelines, anxiously - unable to join the fray, as she still held Connor. She spotted one Nadrah headed for Fred, the sharp blade in its hand. Fred began to scream.

'Fred!' Cordelia cried, 'help her!'

The heads of Wes and Gunn popped up from deep inside the melee, 'Fred?' Gunn grabbed a metal rod, and Wesley grabbed the metal suitcase - and they both hurled them in the direction of the demon threatening the woman they had a crush on.

The curtains billowed again, and Doyle ran in, 'I'm here…' he gasped, 'I'm…' he looked around at the brawling demons and the tied up Fred, 'late,' he finished - and leapt into the battle, chopping away with his axe.

The metal instruments flew through the air and hit their targets. The metal rod succeeded in knocking the Nadrah with the sword away from Fred, whilst the suitcase flew in a neat arc - sailing past Fred and smashing down onto the prince's neck, decapitating him. It then hit the wall and burst open, showering money around the room.

There was a moment of silence - of utter stillness - as everyone looked at the now headless Prince. 'Well,' said Gunn, wriggling loose from the now still Nahdhras, 'I guess you cut off the snake's head….' The Nadrahs picked up their weapons and turned back on the team, '... you piss off the other snakes,' the street fighter finished up, lamely.

The demons dived on them once again, and the men got back to fighting - whilst Cordelia stayed out of the way, holding Connor close - and kicking out at anyone who came near her.

The three men were buried under the assault, Cordelia was being forced further back, and Fred and Lorne were still tied up. The situation looked bad. And then the sky light came crashing in, fragments of glass raining down on the floor. Cordelia curled herself around Connor to protect him from the falling shards. And Angel dropped down into the fracas, starting to throw fast and furious punches in each direction.

Wesley and Gunn crawled out from under the onslaught - and made their way over to Fred, where they began to try and free her. The clasps were tricky, and they kept getting attacked by Nahdrahs and having to abandon what they were doing to fend them off. Angel was still punching - but he was weaponless and the Nahdrah were almost entirely encased in metal.

One Nahdrah made a run at Cordy and the baby, and he wrenched himself free and dove on top of her - knocking her to the ground and shielding her and his child with his body.

'Angel, man,' Doyle threw his axe at the vampire, and Angel beheaded the Nahdrah that had dared to attack the two people he loved most.

He turned back to the fray. Gunn and Wesley were still struggling with Fred's bonds, as she urged them onward, and Doyle was now fighting solo. He launched back in, smashing the heads of two demons together and knocking them out. But there were so many.

Over by the chair, Wesley ducked the blade of another demon, and punched him away and then returned to working on the clamps.

'Hang on,' Doyle shouted, suddenly - from somewhere in the middle of a pile of demons, 'I got an idea.' He reached in his pocket and took out the Tahvalian ascendancy locket. 'Everyone - cover your eyes and keep 'em covered 'til I say so,' he yelled.

All the English speakers in the room did as they were told. Angel threw his arms over his head. Cordelia bent down close over Connor - protecting his eyes as well as her own - and then scrunched her eyes shut. Tied up - Lorne and Fred had to make do with just closing theirs.

The Nahdrahs looked confused, as the fighting stopped, and then Doyle ripped open the locket - and the blinding light tore through the room. The team members kept their eyes firmly shut, as they felt the intensity of the heat hit against their skin. The Nahdrahs began to scream - and then there was a sudden popping noise - and the heat died away.

'OK, y' can look now,' they all heard Doyle say. One by one, they opened their eyes and gazed around at the room. The Nadrahs were now just heaps of metal and puddles of goo on the floor. Doyle was looking faintly sick. 'Y' really don't ever want to watch people melt,' he said to the others, 'it's not pretty.'

Cordelia thrust Connor into Angel's arms and flung her own around Doyle. 'You saved us!' she said, kissing him.

He tried to look modest, 'well … I just happened to have this thing on me.'

'You were a total hero,' she said, kissing him again. The half demon flushed with pleasure.

Angel looked annoyed, and looked away from them, glancing down at his son, instead. He decided to interrupt them. 'I should have listened to you,' he said to Cordelia.

She broke her clasp on Doyle to turn and look at him. 'Well, yeah,' she agreed.

He glanced at Connor again - realising that his infant son had been forced into yet another battle, his third in his very short life. Because Angel had overstretched the team. 'I should never have left you and the baby alone like that,' he said.

Cordy glanced at Doyle, and then back at the vampire, 'well - yeah.'

'Things could've worked out a lot worse than they did, bud,' Doyle said, wrapping an arm around Cordelia and giving Angel a challenging stare. 'This …' he glanced around at the melted demons, 'had better be a lesson to y'. 'Cause next time we might not be so lucky.'

'I know.' His tone was different, now he was talking to Doyle. When talking to Cordelia his voice had been contrite - but now he just sounded bitter and annoyed. Doyle raised an eyebrow at him, and then squeezed Cordelia even harder - giving her another kiss.

Wesley and Gunn finally freed Fred, and helped her to her feet. She looked down at the headless prince. 'If you can keep your head when those about you are losing theirs … guess you're pretty lucky.' Then she beamed at her two rescuers. 'I could kiss you both,' she told them. They immediately both stepped forward.

'Ahem,' Lorne cleared his throat - cutting through the room, 'still tied up down here.'

'Oh,' and Fred moved away from the two men and knelt down to untie Lorne. Casting a dark glance at each other, both men knelt down either side of her and began to help her.

'Yeah, come on,' Lorne said, 'my hands are turning pink.'

'Guys, can I say something?' Angel said, as Lorne was helped to his feet. The vampire cast a glance at the spilled money that still littered the room. 'Money's important. But it - it isn't everything. I got - I got carried away. I just,' he looked down at the sleeping infant cradled in his arms, 'I never had a life that was totally dependent on me, before.' He looked up at the money again - there was just so much of - so many bundles of little notes… 'But that's no excuse…' and each bundle was a small fortune… one could pay off all their bills, another could pay all their expenses for a month… and the rest - the rest could be saved for… he looked at Cordelia. 'Where was I?'

'Money's not the most important,' she prompted.

'No it's not,' he agreed, 'what's important,' he looked down at Connor, and then up at the rest of them, 'is family - and the mission.'

There was a few seconds quiet, as everyone nodded along with the hard lesson well learned - and then - 'they tried to cut Fred's head off,' Cordelia said, 'we earned every penny.'

Angel grinned, 'hold the baby,' he said, and thrust Connor into Cordelia's arms once more - and then ran over to start scooping up the bundles of notes. Cordelia and Doyle looked at one another - over Connor's little head - and she gave her boyfriend an apologetic sort of smile. He shrugged, and turned to watch as the rest of the gang ran over to Angel and helped him pick up all the money.

They shoved the wads of banknotes, into their pockets - so that they were spilling out - and carefully combed the edges of the room to make sure they didn't leave behind a single bill. 'Spending money!' Gunn cawed in delight.

* * *

It was late, when they all arrived back at the Hyperion - laughing and excited with the thought of so much money. Connor was just beginning to stir, ready for his night feed. Angel directed the gang towards the picture safe, took out the piggy bank and then got them all to start stuffing the bundles of cash in there. Only Cordelia and Doyle did not have money to put in. Connor began to cry.

'Um - I'll just - take him up and give him his bottle,' Cordelia said, looking over at Angel, 'as you're busy… if that's OK?' She looked at Doyle for the last part.

But Angel didn't notice, 'yeah yeah go on up - thanks.'

She looked back at her boyfriend. He gave her what he hoped was a warm and reassuring smile, 'you go on up - I'll wait down here for y',' he said, 'there's somethin' I wanna talk to Wes about.'

She looked relieved, gave him a swift kiss, and then headed upstairs with Connor. 'Let's get you back to sleep, little guy,' she said to him as she carried up the stairs. 'Yeah - bottle and then beddy bye - sound good?'

Doyle watched her go. As she disappeared from view, he turned back to the others - and realised that the vampire had also been watching her take the baby to bed. The Irishman's expression hardened. 'If y' done puttin' the cash away, don't you think you should go relieve Cordelia?' he asked Angel, 'you know - actually parent your child? She's been doing it for y' all day.'

'Cordy's got it,' Angel replied - closing the safe up. Doyle continued to stare at him, and he shrugged his shoulders, 'fine - I'll go help out. Though why you think she can't do it herself...'

'It's not that she _can't!_ ' Doyle sounded exasperated, 'it's that she shouldn't have to! She's only 21 and she is not Connor's mother! Y' need to stop pretendin' like she is and take some damn responsibility.'

The excited chatter amongst the other team members died out, as they heard Doyle raise his voice. And there was an awkward and uncomfortable silence, as everyone looked at their shoes and wasn't sure what to say, after Doyle's outburst.

'Fine,' Angel said, staring right back down at the angered Irishman. 'Though I can't help but notice that this is your problem - not Cordy's - she's not the one complaining.'

'Maybe she's too polite,' Doyle bit back.

' _Cordelia?_ ' Angel's tone was withering, 'I'm sorry - I thought you knew her. If Cordy had a problem looking after my kid she'd tell me - she tells me everything.'

The two men continued to glare at each other. 'Not _everythin',_ ' Doyle growled.

Angel held up his hands as if backing off, 'you know what, Doyle? Whatever it is that's eating away at you - making you all bitchy like this - get over it.' He turned round and began to march up the stairs, 'because it's getting real old, real fast,' he muttered as he went.

Doyle took some rapid, sharp breaths and squeezed his fists into a tight ball, as he tried to calm himself down. Then he turned to look at the others, 'uh - sorry about that, guys… I didn't mean… I just … he can't expect the rest of us to pick up his slack. He isn't real good at gettin' the balance right and … I don't want him puttin' everythin' on Cordy, just because she's more competent than him. She has to do too much for us all, already.'

'I think fatherhood is proving to be something of an adjustment for him,' Wesley said, 'but he'll get there.'

'Yeah well - Darla becomin' a vampire proved to be somethin' of an adjustment for him,' Doyle replied, 'and look where that got us all…'

There was another awkward pause.

'Y' know - now we got the cash, I'm thinking celebratory burrito,' Gunn said - changing the subject, and trying to make the atmosphere upbeat, once again, 'Fred, you in?'

'You know I never say no to Mexican,' she grinned. 'Lorne?'

But the green demon smiled, 'I'm gonna leave you crazy kids to it. Have a nightcap and turn in - nighty night.' He waved his hand and followed Angel and Cordelia up the stairs.

'Wesley?' Fred asked, smiling.

The British man was about to answer, when Doyle cut in. 'Actually, Wes - there's somethin' important I wanna talk to y' about. If it's not a bad time?'

Wesley looked disappointed, but agreed. 'Of course,' he said, 'let's go into my office.' Doyle headed into the back room, and Fred and Gunn left the hotel together. Wesley watched them go, sadly.

* * *

Cordelia had slipped her shoes off and was curled up on Angel's bed, cradling Connor as she fed him his bottle. She was having to battle to keep her eyes open. 'Is that good?' she murmured to the baby, 'yeah? It's a good bottle… yeah…'

Angel appeared in the doorway and watched the pair of them for a moment - his face soft, as he enjoyed the image of the woman he loved bonding with his son … like she was his real mother.

'Staring's creepy,' she said - her voice heavy with sleep. She hadn't looked over at him - but she must have sensed him standing there.

'How's he doing?' he asked.

'He's good,' she said, 'he's a good little drinker … and then he'll be ready to sleep.' she yawned. 'I know I am.'

'It's been a rough day,' he said.

'You betcha,' she yawned again, 'crazy busy with clients in the morning… researching all afternoon … and a fight to the death this evening. And now here I am with the little guy….' She gave in to the heaviness - and her eyes drifted closed.

Angel though about what Doyle had said - and considered asking her if she minded all the babysitting she had done today - whether she minded having to be responsible for Connor, whilst Angel was busy. But he found that he didn't really want to discuss Doyle right now - and, he decided, she really didn't look like she minded; falling asleep with the baby in her arms, as if they belonged together.

Instead, he climbed onto the bed with her. 'Tomorrow will be quieter,' he promised, 'and I'll be on Connor duty.'

She smiled, slowly, her eyes still closed, 'he'll like that,' she said, 'he's missed his daddy, today.'

'Yeah, little buddy?' Angel stretched out a finger to tickle his son, 'daddy missed you too.'

* * *

'Are you sure you're feeling alright?' Wesley asked Doyle, after Fred and Gunn had left and he had shut the office door.

'Why wouldn't I be?'

Wesley looked like he was thinking very carefully about what to say in response. 'You just seem - angry - I suppose, at Angel, mostly. We've all noticed it.'

'You have?'

The British man nodded. 'If there's something bothering you…'

'There's not,' Doyle interrupted.

Wesley raised his eyebrows, 'I'm afraid I have to disagree. Now, if you wish to keep it to yourself, then I have no wish to pry. But as your boss - and your friend - you know I'm always here to listen.'

'Thanks, man.'

'So - what was it you wished to discuss?'

Doyle sighed - and took the locket out from inside his jacket. He placed it on the desk. 'This is what I was out lookin' for today - and I'll give it back to its rightful owner tomorrow, should get us another bundle of cash.'

Wesley picked it up to examine it, turning it over in his hands.

'Don't open it,' Doyle warned. 'It's a Tahvalian ascendency locket. Cordelia looked it up whilst I was out trackin' it down.' He chuckled, wryly, 'powerful little blighter, it turned out to be.'

'Yes,' Wesley agreed, frowning at it, 'I saw what it did to the Nahdrahs.'

'There's more to it than that, though,' Doyle explained. Wesley put the locket down and looked across at his friend, focusing on him, instead. 'That light - the melty one? It's the essence of an ancient demon - Tahval,' Doyle said, 'and when it melts someone it also absorbs their powers and - uh - kinda gives those powers to the one who wielded the locket.'

'I see,' Wesley nodded, 'and you just wielded the locket.'

'And melted all the Nahdrah guys… and now …'

'And now you've absorbed their powers,' the watcher finished his sentence for him. The half demon nodded, and Wesley noticed that he looked almost a little afraid. 'What is it that you wish to know?' he asked, 'what do you want me to do for you?'

'Well - I guess - I was sorta hopin' that you might look up these Nahdrah guys. Find out what powers they got - what powers I got, now… and - uh - I guess, just tell me what it all means … for me.'

Wesley tried to smile reassuringly, 'why would it have to mean anything?'

Doyle hung his head, and concentrated on his hands for a while. He interlocked his fingers and tapped his right finger tips on the knuckles of his left hand. 'Well - um - am I… am I more demon now? Than I was already? Am I…' he took a deep breath, 'am I less human?'

'Oh, Doyle, no! Of course not.' Wesley reached out and put his own hand on top of the Irishman's and squeezed it, comfortingly. 'You took their power - not their DNA. You haven't changed species. You're exactly as you always were … just with a few - added extras.' He smiled, 'Why don't I get us a drink?'

He got up and took out two tumblers and a bottle of scotch from the cabinet. He poured them each a generous slug. Doyle tossed his own drink straight back, and slammed the glass back down on the table. 'OK - so I'm not part Nahdrah - but I got their power? Well? What is their power? … What can I do?'

Wesley took a swig from his own glass. 'Well - I will of course start researching them in full detail - to make sure there are no - unwelcome surprises - further down the line. But from what I can tell … they didn't seen to have much in the way of supernatural abilities. They were just - demons. They could fight well enough, but nothing to write home about - no super strength, or healing ability. I don't believe they could shoot laser beams from their eyes.'

'Pity.'

The watcher chuckled, 'they were a logical race,' he explained.

'What - like Mr. Spock?'

'Not exactly - they were …"puzzle people", was how Fred described them. Their powers - their interests - seemed to be linked to the solving of puzzles. I can't really imagine having imbibed that power will make a huge difference to your everyday life - except you now might be able to complete the New York Times crossword in record time.'

'I'll have to give that a try,' he poured himself another drink. 'So that's it?'

'Well - I suppose there is now a chance that you can remove your head and sew another one onto your body when your current one wears out,' the watcher told him. He caught sight of Doyle's face. 'You might just want to give that one a miss, though,' he smiled, 'just because you _can_ do something doesn't mean you _have_ to.'

'Thanks, bud.'

'My pleasure.'

'No - I mean it. I really feel better now. If I can ever return the favour …'

'Well - I hope you return the locket to its rightful owner, tomorrow, and we never use it again.'

Doyle chuckled, 'you know what I mean.'

'Yes - and I appreciate it. Now - are you sure there is nothing else bothering you? Anything else you want to talk about?'

'No man, it's all good.' He drank the last of his whisky, 'I better head on up and find out what's takin' Cordy so long.'

* * *

' _Go to sleep… my baby peep,'_ Cordelia sang, softly. She and Angel had long since lain down on the bed - their eyes closed, but their faces turned towards each other. Connor lay in between them, still drinking from the bottle that Cordelia held. The two adults were discussing what to do with their new money - as they drifted off to sleep. 'I'm just saying - a boat,' she said - her voice was still heavy - her words came out slowly.

'No. College fund.' Angel's voice was just as heavy.

'Yes - college fund. And pay off our bills … and put a down payment on a boat.'

'We're not getting a boat.' His voice was thick with sleep, but he was still adamant. He moved his hand, to stroke Connor's head, and ended up holding Cordelia's hand instead. They lay together on the bed, eyes closed, feeding the baby between them.

'They're fun.'

'They're expensive…. And when would I go on a boat?'

'Moonlight sails…' she suggested, 'OK - college fund - pay our bills - and rent a ski condo in Aspen.'

'Ski Condo?'

'There's gotta be some fun in our lives.'

'Hmm - I like a ski condo.'

'Sure,' her voice became even slower and heavier - each word taking longer to get out, as sleep over took her. 'Snow … trees… chipmunk robots on ice…' she lost her coherence as the somnolence took her… and she drifted off into a dream state, lying beside the vampire.

...

Doyle stood in the doorway - and watched them both. He heard Cordy's voice grow ever heavier and eventually lose all sense, as she fell asleep. Then there was just the sound of her heavy, rhythmic breathing - and the steady rise and fall of her chest. Angel lay completely still beside her. Connor lay in the middle of them both, squirming and sucking on his bottle.

Doyle watched the three of them sleep together for a long, long time. And then - eventually - he pushed himself away from the door frame and turned on his heel. He left Cordelia with Angel, and returned to his room - alone.


	45. Waiting in the Wings: Part One

'OK - ready - three two one - go,' Cordelia clicked the button on her stopwatch - making the timer start - and Wesley and Doyle each grabbed their own copy of that day's NYT crossword. The men scribbled furiously. Cordelia watched them both, and kept an eye on the stopwatch.

Doyle frowned and scratched his head, and then began to write again. Wesley was muttering to himself - and then 'done!' Doyle pronounced slapping his puzzle down.

Cordelia hit pause, and the timer stopped. '4 minutes 36 seconds,' she said, grinning. She kissed her boyfriend, 'it's a new record.'

'I'm not sure if they're gettin' easier or if I'm gettin' better,' Doyle said - he looked flushed with the exertion.

Wesley put down his own copy of the cross word - it was about a quarter completed. 'They get harder throughout the week,' he told the Irishman, 'your prowess is growing every day.'

Doyle looked very pleased with himself - and Cordelia kissed him again. 'It must be kinda embarrassing for you, though, huh?' she said to Wesley. 'You of the ginormous brain getting beaten at word puzzles by Francis "I failed my SATs" Doyle.'

'Hey - now!' Doyle protested. 'I'm Irish - I never took any SATs… I failed my Leaver's Cert.'

'Oh - I do apologise,' she laughed, 'still - I'm proud of you. It's another _completely lame_ superpower … but I'm proud of you.'

'Hey!' he looked at her mock sternly, 'I'm racking the superpowers up! What super powers you got, Princess?'

'Well… there's my keen fashion sense… and my icy stare.' They kissed again.

'Of course it could come in very useful for the team,' Wesley mused.

The couple broke apart and looked at him. 'My icy stare?' Cordelia asked, in confusion.

Wesley tutted, 'of course not - Doyle's puzzle solving abilities. I imagine his ability to decode and decipher could help us with all sorts - arithmancy, translations...'

'Doyle sucks at languages,' Cordelia pointed out, 'that's where you come in. He sees the monsters in his head - you bore us to death about them from your big old books.'

Wesley looked mildly put out. 'Well - I'm sorry if my research inconveniences you,' he said sarcastically. 'Doyle won't be able to translate the words, themselves, it's true - but the patterning of the texts, the structures … he should be a great help, from now on, in at least using the rhythm of the language to spot where the key information is. Then I can do the rest.'

'How come I get extra homework now?' Doyle asked, looking between Cordelia and Wesley, 'how is that fair?'

But his girlfriend shrugged, 'I guess it's just a shame that those Nyazian scroll thingies got stolen. Now Mr. Cryptic, here, could have solved the whole damn thing in a jiffy.'

'Yes,' Wesley looked thoughtful. 'He could help me out with the language - and Fred out with the maths.'

'Talking of Fred,' Cordy said. Wesley looked startled, and the woman grinned mischievously, 'how goes the plan to ask her out?'

Doyle looked surprised, 'y' thinkin' of askin' Fred out?'

' _Duh!'_ His girlfriend rolled her eyes, 'where have you been? He's been nuts about her for months.'

'No - I know - it's just … I didn't know we were at the askin' her out stage already.'

Wesley flushed bright red, and began to stammer. 'I - uh - I'm not - there .. yet. In fact. It's you know … timing is very … I'll make my move when I feel the iron is hot.'

Cordelia arched an eyebrow, 'well make it quick - if you wanna feel more than your hot iron.' Doyle sniggered. Wesley flushed even deeper.

'What's going on?' Angel turned up beside the small group.

Cordelia raked her eyes over him, 'I see you went with the dark clothes, today,' she said.

Angel glanced down at his outfit, and then shook his head. 'Ask me why I'm smiling,' he said to them.

'I will,' Cordy replied, 'but only because it's scaring me.'

'Because we…' Angel stuck his hand into his back pocket and pulled out 6 tickets, and held them up so the others could see, '... are stepping out.'

* * *

Gunn pushed the gate to the courtyard open and allowed Fred to walk in in front of him. 'You are a remarkable woman,' he was telling her, 'particularly the way you can shovel a mountain range of food into your mouth. That is some Olympian feat - that much eatin'.'

Fred giggled, 'was I a pig?' she asked. 'It's just that the first breakfast always seems to go so quick. And I'm always still….'

'Nah, I was just wonderin' where it all goes in that little stick figure body you got.'

She laughed again - sounding mock outraged this time, 'stick? You're a beast!'

'Ah - you know you're gorgeous.' He walked up the steps into the Hyperion; Fred stood still and watched his back - a soft and wondering expression on her face.

* * *

When he walked into the lobby, Gunn saw the four other team members all huddled around the counter - looking at something. 'Morning friends and neighbours,' he joined the group and looked at what they were looking at. 'Ooh - are those the tickets? You got 'em?'

'Well,' Angel started to say, 'I got to the ticket place and…'

'I'm paying you back,' Gunn interrupted, 'this one's on me.' Fred appeared in the lobby and drifted over to the group - her expression still a little dreamy. 'Mata Hari is the tightest band in L.A. You guys are gonna be trippin' out,' Gunn said.

Doyle snorted.

'You don't believe me, Irish?'

'I think you need to speak to Angel.'

'Yeah - Like I was saying,' the vampire tried once more, 'the only thing is...'

'Look, I'm good for it,' Gunn promised, taking the tickets out of Angel's hand. 'You don't have to worry about dippin' into Connor's college fund. Last time I saw Mata Hari at the troubadour they were…' he squinted at the tickets, and trailed off from speaking. Then he looked up at Angel. 'Blinnikov World Ballet Tour. What's going on?'

'And here we go…' muttered Doyle to Cordelia. She hid a smirk behind her hand.

'I was trying to tell you!' Angel said, 'I got to the ticket place and boom! Tonight only.'

Gunn looked down at the tickets in his hand - his expression one of disappointment and confusion, 'but - you got _ballet_ on my Mata Hari tickets.'

'This is the Blinnikov World Ballet Tour,' Angel said - as if that made everything OK.

Cordelia rolled her eyes, 'he keeps saying that,' she told Gunn, 'as if it means something.'

'I think it means we're gonna be spendin' the night watchin' a bunch of Russians prance around to Swan Lake, darlin'.' The Irishman wrinkled his face up, 'what's that about, again?'

'Not Swan Lake,' Angel corrected, 'Giselle! They're one of the premier companies in the world - and it's their signature piece.' But Gunn was shaking his head - this was all like some horrible dream. He was not convinced by the vampire's enthusiasm.

'I think I've heard of them,' Wesley said, thoughtfully, 'very ahead of their time.'

'Oh yeah, yeah,' Angel agreed, eagerly, 'I saw their production of Giselle in 1890. I cried like a baby. _And I was evil, then!_ '

'Did Darla cry?' Doyle asked.

'No - but Spike did.'

Cordelia laughed out loud. Fred smiled, nervously. 'I think it sounds like fun,' she ventured. Immediately, Wesley agreed with her. Not so Gunn. This was not Mata Hari. This was tutus - and guys with their big - ass packages jumping up and down.

'Hey! It takes a lot of man to wear a pair o' tights in public,' Doyle said, thinking back to the silky pantyhose he had been made to wear in Pylea - and the bulge that went along with that.

But Gunn wasn't interested. He looked at Angel, 'this is just … I will never trust you again. The trust is gone.'

'Oh get over it,' Cordy snorted, 'do we get dressed up?'

'Of course!' the excited vampire said.

'I'm in.'

'Guys,' Angel looked around at them all, 'seeing ballet - live,' he sighed, dreamily, 'it's like another world. Gunn - these guys are tight. And you are gonna be tripping out.'

Gunn folded his arms. 'Don't be usin' my own phrases when we lost the trust,' he snapped.

* * *

Down at the theatre, the manager greeted the director of the company. He stuttered as he spoke - it was such an honour to have them here. Dancing Giselle! The whole of L.A was buzzing about it - and the manager could not imagine what it would be like.

The director fiddled with his tie, before he spoke - straightening it. He had a Russian cross pinned to it, with a red stone in the middle. It drew the manager's attention - making him stare. 'It will be - the performance of a lifetime,' the director said.

...

Up in the stage rigging - some grey skinned figures looked down on the two men. They began to laugh a hysterical, high pitched giggle, as they watched from the shadows.

* * *

Cordelia led Fred around the fancy, high-end boutique she had selected. Cordy was in her element - but Fred was less sure and looked around the place nervously, 'are you certain this is the place for us?' she asked. She could not see how they could possibly afford the dresses on sale here.

But Cordelia merely smiled. 'The guys are all renting tuxes,' she said, 'except Doyle - he isn't allowed to wear formal wear.' She shuddered with the painful memories. 'So we gotta step up.'

Fred scrunched her face up. Renting was one thing - but this place didn't look like it rented. 'But aren't we, y'know, poor?'

Once again, Cordelia smiled, serenely, 'there is a custom amongst my people,' she told the other woman, 'it's called: "buying a dress, wearing it once, and returning it the next day".' She grinned even more broadly, 'it's all about hiding the tags whilst its on.'

That made Fred grin too. 'OK. I'm very excited about tonight,' she admitted, 'I just love the ballet. My family used to go see the Nutcracker every Christmas and I had my first ever sexual dream about the Mouseking.'

Cordelia paused, as she rifled through the dresses; she gave Fred a glance ... and then decided not to comment. 'OK, face me,' she said, selecting a dress and holding up against the other woman. But then she shook her head, replaced it on the rack and started looking for another.

Fred watched her for a moment, working up the courage to speak - and then - 'Can I ask you something?'

'I think you're perfect for each other,' Cordelia replied, without even looking up. Fred stood in stunned silence; Cordelia smiled to herself, 'I'm Cordelia Chase,' she said, 'I _always_ know.'

'It's not like we've said anything,' the other woman admitted, looking down at her feet and chewing on her lip. 'But he's so sweet … and commanding. And I feel so comfortable around him. I mean, I don't even know if he feels…'

'He feels.'

'Feelings?' she looked up.

Cordelia grinned. 'Definite feelings. We find the right outfit for tonight and there may be actual feeling.'

That made Fred grin. 'OK - and then we gotta find you the perfect outfit.' Cordelia held another dress up against her and Fred looked down at it. 'Hey - how come you don't let Doyle wear formal clothes?' she asked - thinking about what the other woman had said earlier, 'with all the guys renting tuxes, I would've have thought you'd want him to look - you know - pretty?'

Cordy tilted her head to one side, 'I love Doyle,' she replied, 'he always looks pretty to me. But no formal clothes - there was… an unpleasantness last year. Kind of took the shine off sharp suits on men for me. Especially Doyle. But it's OK - I'll find him a nice shirt that is classy enough for the theatre but that doesn't require a tie. He'll look spiffy when I'm through with him.'

'Yeah but - you know he'll be comparing himself to Angel. And Angel will be comparing himself to Doyle.'

Cordelia's face twisted up in confusion, 'why on earth would either of them be doing that?'

Fred stared at her in disbelief. For Cordelia Chase - who claimed to _always_ know - she sure could be blind about some things! 'Well - I think they're both gonna wanna look their best for you.'

Cordy snorted. 'If Doyle didn't have a phobia about public nudity, he wouldn't even bother with clothes - he doesn't care about how he looks. Have you seen his shirts? And Angel? Yeah right - the champion of the people is gonna spend all day worrying about his outfit.' But Fred just smiled, secretly, to herself.

* * *

'Is it gonna be alright?' Angel asked, his voice panicked, 'is there gonna be a stain?'

Lorne just gave him a calming look, over the top of the tuxedo jacket that he was currently wiping down with soda water. 'Relax, crumb cake,' he said.

Angel peered down into the crib, at his sleeping son - the cause of his current anxiety. Having gotten himself all tricked out in his rented tux - feeling all James Bond and suave - he had picked up his infant child for a cuddle and … baby sick. Right down the back. This was just his luck. Doyle wasn't gonna turn up covered in baby sick - and Cordelia was the type to notice those kinds of details. 'Well - at least he's sleeping, now,' the vampire said - softly brushing a finger against Connor's warm skin.

'Who wouldn't?' Lorne asked him, 'after that sweet Irish lullaby you crooned. A hair flat on the bridge, but - more to the point - _Cordelia?'_

Angel whipped around in alarm, 'what about her?'

'I read you whilst you were singing, you big corn muffin,' the anagogic demon confessed, 'and I can't say I blame you, she's grown into one heck of a woman. But… you need to tread very carefully there, my friend.'

'You're not supposed to be reading me,' the vampire snapped, 'anyway - you're reading me wrong.' He sat down on the edge of his bed and began to put his shoes on.

Lorne smiled sympathetically. 'It isn't just when you sing, strudel. You know we have this term back in Pylea - Kyrumption.'

'Never heard of it.'

'Well it's when two great heroes come together…'

'There will be no coming together,' Angel hastily interrupted.

But the Host just continued to smile his singular, knowing smirk. 'You can't fight Kyrumption, cinnamon buns. It's fate. It's in the stars. And in this case it can lead to a whole, unworldly mess.'

'I get it, OK?' Shoes on, he got back to his feet, 'and stop calling me pastries.' He began to pace.

Lorne watched him for a moment, before speaking again. 'You're a man of many limitations, Angel - but you're a man. And these feelings you have - brewing inside - they're powerful, and they're gonna come crashing out - one of these days - if you keep them all repressed like this.'

'So what do you suggest, huh?' Angel demanded, 'that I just go up to her and tell her how I feel… _that's gonna end well_.'

Lorne shrugged, 'maybe it would - for you. But here's the thing, bub, you've fallen in love with a woman whose heart is not free. Whatever happens, from here on out, there's gonna be pain for somebody. And you run the risk of destroying relationships.'

'You mean Doyle and Cordelia?'

'I mean you and Doyle,' Lorne answered simply. He sat down in the chair next to the crib, and fixed a compassionate eye on the confused vampire. 'You two wouldn't be the first set of friends to fall out over a girl - and I'm sad to say you wouldn't be the last, either. I'm not here to tell you to back off or bow out - that's Cordy's job, if it's what she wants - I'm just telling you to really search your heart. Before you do anything - before you do nothing - decide what is it you really hope to gain... and exactly what it is you are prepared to lose, in the process. Once you think you know - then either throw your hat in the ring, or move the heck on. But don't live in this lovelorn limbo, champ, it is not a healthy place to dwell.'

Angel looked down at his shoes, 'I've had these … feelings, for so long now. I was never going to say anything. That was my plan. But…'

'It gets harder everyday,' Lorne nodded in sympathy.

'Yeah,' Angel sighed, 'and Cordelia… she's …'

... 'she's what?' The woman herself was stood leaning on the door-frame, wearing a long, black evening gown with a plunging neckline. Her hair was piled high on top of her head.

Angel jumped, 'I - I was just saying that you're not much of a ballet fan.'

'Well, I don't think any of us are, bud,' Doyle appeared in the doorway, beside his girlfriend, 'and yet here we all are - 'cause you can't be trusted not to impulse buy when we send you out alone.' He shook his head, and smiled at Cordy, 'y'know - he's 245 - we should be able to send him out by now, without a babysitter.' Cordelia giggled.

Angel shuffled his feet awkwardly. He had been right - the Irishman had not turned up covered in baby sick. He had a crisp white shirt on, - open at the collar, and with the sleeves rolled up. Over the top, he wore a black vest, and his black leather jacket was slung casually over his shoulder. The way Cordelia was looking at him made Angel's heart hurt. He wanted to punch something. 'You're sure they're gonna let you in like that?' he asked instead, 'no tie - and a waistcoat doesn't make up for a lack of jacket. You can't just waltz in there in your shirt sleeves.'

But Doyle only shrugged, 'I'll button my coat up, who's gonna know until it's too late?'

'Yeah - it's not like all the 105 year olds that will be there tonight have vampire night vision; once the lights go down, the coat can come off,' Cordy agreed, 'you're worrying about nothing. Come on.' She linked one arm through Doyle's and held the other out for Angel, 'tonight we are forgetting our usual dreary selves and instead we'll be a small group of debonair sophisticates out enjoying the town. What do you think?'

Angel linked his arm with hers, 'sounds good.' He glanced back at Lorne, as they left, and the green demon gave him a sympathetic, but encouraging smile.

* * *

'You gotta promise not to laugh,' Gunn said. Out in the lobby, Fred promised. 'It's gotta come from the heart,' the street fighter insisted.

Fred rolled her eyes, 'I promise - stop being so silly.'

'Alright,' with a deep breath, Gunn stepped out from behind the door and into view, spreading his arms wide so the woman could get a good look at him. Fred burst out laughing, and her hands flew to her mouth. 'This is what you're promises are worth?' He said to her, 'I'm havin' a lot of trust issues at this time of my life.'

'I'm sorry,' she apologised - still giggling a little, 'it's just - my god - you're so _pretty_!'

Gunn began to smile, 'you know, there's not a lot of people could say that to me and live. But - the way you look - there's no way I can fight you.'

Fred glanced down at her long, red dress and blushed. 'Tonight feels … I don't know - kinda magical. Is that stupid?'

'Not at all,' it was Wesley who answered her. He stepped up close, so he was right beside her, practically touching - and smiled down. He wrapped her silver shawl about her shoulders for her - then he looked up at Gunn. 'so - out of hiding at last?'

'Yeah - and look at my reward.' He nodded at Fred, who blushed again.

Wesley, still standing so very close to her, agreed, 'yes, isn't she a vision?'

'A lot of that going around,' Gunn said, raising an eyebrow as he caught sight of Cordy coming down the stairs in between Doyle and Angel.

Fred looked up at them too - and her face broke out into another big smile. 'Oh - wow - Cordy you were right, his _is_ pretty!'

'Is that just, like, your go to word for guys?' Gunn asked her, ''cause you know there are better words, right?'

Angel was looking halfway between uncomfortable and flattered, 'you called me pretty?' he said to Cordelia, 'really?'

'Not you - dumbass,' she replied, ' _Doyle._ '

'Oh,' the vampire's face fell.

It was Doyle's turn to look flattered - and pleasantly surprised, 'you said _I_ was pretty?' he asked his girlfriend.

' _Duh!_ You're gorgeous!' She leaned forward and gave him a quick peck on the lips. When they broke apart he was looking very pleased with himself. Angel looked glum - but was trying to hide it.

As the group swept their way out of the lobby, Cordelia grabbed Wesley for a quick moment alone. 'The iron is hot,' she whispered, before rejoining the two demons. Wesley looked from her - over to Fred. He smiled to himself, and then went to escort the beautiful physicist out of the hotel.


	46. Waiting in the Wings: Part Two

The theatre was grand, and had a large, sweeping staircase - which they followed all the way to top - to the upper balcony. They found their seats and settled down. Wes, Fred and Gunn had three seats together on one row. Doyle and Cordy had two seats directly behind them, and Angel was in the third row - by himself - just one seat up and one seat along from Doyle. 'Sorry they're not closer,' the vampire hissed, leaning forwards to speak to his friends, 'but getting six seats - almost together...'

'Nonsense,' Wesley reassured him, 'best place - we get the whole panorama from here.'

'Besides,' Cordelia added, twisting her neck so she could look back at Angel, 'back here we stand less chance of setting off the "under seventy" alarm.'

'Back in the day I'd always get box seats. Or I'd just eat the people who had 'em.'

Doyle and Cordy glanced at each other, 'don't let's reminisce,' the woman suggested, 'we're here. Enjoy.'

Just then, the lights dimmed - an expectant hush fell over the gathered audience - the music of the overture began to swell and then the curtain rose. The scenery was staged to depict a simple, Rhineland village - and, as a lone dancer, Hilarion, made his way onto the stage - the director smiled down from his box. Tonight would be the way it was always meant to be. Tonight would be perfect. The lights from the stage caught the red jewel in his Russian cross, making it flash in the darkness. Down on the stage, Hilarion left a gift outside Giselle's cottage - blew a kiss, and then danced off.

...

By the time the music changed, and the Corps de Ballet danced in from stage left, Cordelia was already fast asleep - and snoring loudly, in her seat. Doyle smiled and wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close so that her head lolled against his shoulder. He rested his head on top of her own. But he was aware of the feeling of being watched - in the dark. The sensation came from almost directly behind him … and he knew of only one person, on that upper balcony, who could see in the dark and would have a keen interest on what he and Cordy were up to. Well - let him watch - it wasn't like Doyle hadn't seen Angel cuddle up to Cordelia and fall asleep the week before. Let the vampire see how it felt. The memory made him frown… until Cordelia snorted loudly, in her sleep, and he began to chuckle, softly.

...

On the row in front of them, Wesley turned to watch Fred - as she watched the ballet. Her face was flushed and her eyes were sparkling, and Wesley could not tear his eyes away from her. She, however, could not look away from the stage.

Neither could Gunn. As the ballet continued, he found himself captivated by the lifts and the jumps; the strength it must take to jump and land on pointed toes; the agility it must take to perform an arabesque; the reflexes needed for the pas de chat and the raw power necessary for the grand jete. This world was something else - something he could never have conceived of. He leaned forward for a better view and, like Fred, his eyes began to shine.

...

Down on the stage, Giselle met Albrecht - and they began to dance together, their famous courting dance. The director smiled to himself - he never tired of this. Giselle jumped in the air en pointe, beating her feet together and then landed. Her foot slipped, just a very slight wobble, but she was caught in Albrecht's arms and recovered. The director did not even notice, so entranced in the dance was he … nor was he the only man entranced by a girl, in the dark.

...

Angel watched Cordelia's head rest on Doyle's shoulder, and the dark head of the half demon rest on top of hers. Doyle's arm was still wrapped around her and he was gently stroking the bare skin of her arm, as she slept. It was a long time before the vampire remembered where he was - and how much he had been looking forward to tonight. He dragged his eyes away from the woman he loved - and the man who held her - and forced himself to look at the stage. After a moment, he began to frown. A moment later, still, he leaned forward - as Gunn had done - but his eyes were not shining with appreciation. His frown deepened… and after a while, it turned into a scowl.

...

Act one drew to close, Giselle's mother and the heartbroken Hilarion wept over the dead body of the peasant girl - and the chorus backed away. The music rose in a crescendo of mourning, and the curtain fell and the lights came back on. 'Bravo Bravo,' yelled Gunn, leaping to his feet and applauding furiously.

Cordelia jerked upright, with a final snort, 'I loved it,' she gasped, beginning to applaud.

Doyle chuckled, again. 'It's just the interval, darlin'.'

'Oh.'

'On the bright side - when we went to the Panto with school every Christmas, we got ice cream in the interval,' he craned his neck to look around, 'y'think they sell ice cream here?'

'Let's find out - there has to be some saving grace to this evening.'

'I thought the saving grave to this evening was how pretty I looked?' Doyle asked, as the pair of them got to their feet and began to edge their way towards the aisle, keeping an eye out for ice cream vendors, as they went.

'But you always look pretty,' Cordelia complained, 'I could have got you dressed up like this and then taken out you to dinner and a movie.'

'Or skinny dipping,' Doyle suggested, 'whatever happened to that idea?'

'It's winter.'

'Yeah … in L.A - not really. Hey, if you can stay awake the second half, we can pretend like it's the movies - make out through the whole thing.'

'Sounds good to me.' They reached the lobby and met up with the others.

'Nice to hear you two are enjoying it so much,' Angel said drily.

'Man - you guys are buggy,' Gunn said to the young couple, he looked at the others, 'OK - I'll say it once, and you can gloat all you like: These guys are tight and I'm trippin' out.'

'They certainly live up to their reputation,' Wesley agreed, he spoke to Angel, 'has the choreography changed much since …'

'No, Nothing's changed.'

'Well, it's wonderful they're able to…'

'No,' corrected the vampire, 'I mean _nothing's changed._ These are the same dancers I saw before.'

'That's impossible!' Fred protested, her voice was disbelieving, 'we're watching the same troupe you saw in 1990?'

'I think he said 1890,' Gunn whispered to her.

'Oh… that's much more impossible.'

'So,' Angel said, looking at the whole group, 'somebody wanna tell me how we're watching a show starring people who should have died sixty years ago?' The whole gang exchanged glances, but no one could volunteer any theories.

'It's a puzzler alright,' Cordelia said, 'so,... are there snacks?'

* * *

'So what are we thinking? Vampires?' Wesley asked.

Gunn was quick to agree - that would explain the precision and athleticism, he enthused - some of those jumps were just… he caught himself, and looked annoyed. 'You know, I was cool before I met you all.'

'You're right, man,' Doyle said to him, struggling to keep a straight face, 'your love o' prancin' vamps in tutus is _our_ fault.'

Cordelia snickered, 'dancing vampires? Who's not scared?'

But Angel poured cold water all over their assumptions. Those dancers were not vampires. If they were - he would have been able to sense it.

'Even all the way back there?' Wesley sounded surprised. Angel glared at him. '... with the... panoramic view,' the watcher hastily amended.

Angel did not stop scowling - but he decided that this needed checking out. And he wasn't waiting until the end of the show either. Gunn and Fred looked a little disappointed - but the vampire told his friends they should all head back inside. He would snoop alone.

'I'm with snoopy,' Cordelia said, 'the magic of the ballet - not really getting to me.'

'How will the dancers keep time without your rhythmic snoring?' Wesley asked, wickedly - just as the lights dimmed and a delicate chiming informed the audience it was time to return to their seats.

'Don't think that's not coming back to haunt you,' she replied.

Fred, Gunn and Wesley made their way back to their seats. Doyle watched them go, 'well - if our makin' out plan is off, then I'm not goin' back there to sit by myself and be bored to tears. I guess I'll come monster huntin' too.'

Angel looked put out. Doyle pretended not to notice. Cordelia didn't notice. 'We don't know that it's monsters,' she said to him, linking her arm through his as they made their way down the stairs and away from the auditorium.

'It's always monsters,' he answered.

* * *

They made their way through the now deserted lobby, snuck past a couple of ushers who were still closing the auditorium doors, and eventually found their way to the backstage area. The door was guarded by a massive security guard. 'Check out the zeppelin,' Cordy hissed.

'Seems a lot of muscle for a ballet company.' This was suspicious. Angel had been backstage plenty of times in the past - opera stars didn't eat _themselves_ , you know. Never - even when the company harboured the most famous and adored Prima Donna of the day - had he seen a company take security this seriously.

'He's human - right?' Doyle whispered, 'I can't exactly go cactus face here, to check - but that guy is just a regular Joe - but a massive one.'

'Yeah,' Angel agreed, 'so my patented burst of sudden violence should work out just fine.'

'That's not what I meant,' Doyle replied, 'I mean - if the ballet dancers are monsters… what do they need some guy in a cheap uniform, with a gun, to stand outside and guard 'em? Their own … claws... or what not, should be up to the task of defending themselves.'

'Yeah - and let's not forget their precision and athleticism,' Cordelia remembered Gunn's enthusiastic words.

'So what are you saying?' Angel asked.

'Just that… I'm sure you're right and somethin'... untoward is goin' on. But that it might be more - I dunno - _magical_ , than creature feature, I guess? Whatever's behind that door - maybe we need to tread carefully.'

'He's Mr. Logic, puzzle boy now,' Cordelia said to Angel, 'you should listen to him.'

Angel looked even more put out. Once again, Doyle pretended not to notice. 'We should avoid causin' a scene,' he said.

'So you want me to go talk to him?' Cordelia nodded in the direction of the behemoth security guard, 'make with the nice nice whilst you guys slip by?'

Angel snorted, 'Don't be stupid. I'm that guy and the most beautiful girl I've ever seen is making eyes at me? It's either a bachelor party or a scam.'

'What did you just call me?'

'I'm sorry - I didn't mean to call you stupid.'

'No - after that.'

It was Doyle's turn to snort in derision, 'I'm not sure, darlin' - but I think he might have just implied that you look like the stripper at a stag do. You don't by the way - you look very classy.'

'You think I look like a stripper?' Cordelia turned injured eyes on Angel, who in turn glared daggers at Doyle. Once more, the half demon pretended not to notice - though he was having trouble hiding his smirk.

'No - I - uh … I wasn't thinking…I don't ...' the vampire was becoming flustered.

'So you just subconsciously just _believe_ I am the sort of girl that works bachelor parties?'

'No - I … uh… I meant it as a compliment...'

'You think callin' Cordy a stripper is complimentin' her?' He knew he shouldn't stir up trouble, it was beneath him. But he was getting fed up of the way Angel kept making eyes at his girlfriend, and treating him like it was he that was the third wheel.

'No! I ... Look I'm just gonna knock that guy out and then we can discuss this later. OK?'

'We're not meant to be causin' a scene.'

'I think not causing a scene went out the window a couple of strippers ago,' Cordelia remarked drily, 'but I think I have a way of getting past that guy that might be a little more subtle.'

...

'Hey!' Cordelia approached the guard, her thousand kilowatt smile fixed firmly in place, 'do you like bribes?' She held up some notes. Angel and Doyle glanced at each other - this was supposed to be subtle? But it seemed to be working.

The guards face lit up - his smile matching her own, 'do I ever!'

'Well, we _really_ wanna go backstage.'

The man took the bills from her, and glanced at them. 'Yeah. OK. But this isn't so much of a bribe as it is a tip. And seeing as how I'm not parking your car…' he handed the money back. Angel and Doyle glanced at each other, again - and then the vampire knocked out the security guard with a hard right cross to the jaw. As the man crumpled to the ground, the three of them swept past him and went backstage.

* * *

They stared down the corridor - it was heavily carpeted and lit by flickering gas lamps on the wall - and it just went on - and on. 'Okay,' said Cordelia, peering into the distance - and only seeing yet more corridor, 'we all saw the building when we drove past. Does either of you remember it going on forever?'

'It's clearly a spell - or a time flux,' Angel said.

'Like I said,' Doyle nodded, 'magic.'

'Right - we don't wanna go rushing in here.' Both his companions agreed. This needed to be treated carefully - the usual slice and dice might not cut it, this time.

Cordy suggested that they head back to the others - and discuss options. They turned to leave - but now the door had vanished, and the corridor simply stretched on into forever in the other direction, as well.

'Works in theory,' Angel said. He glanced at Doyle, 'well?'

'What?'

'You're puzzle boy now - what's going on?'

'Uhm - I'm really better at the word jumble - and those cryptogram thingies. This kinda mystery is way above my pay-grade.'

Angel tutted. Doyle looked annoyed. 'Well, you don't know what's goin' on either!' he pointed out.

Angel rounded on him, but Cordelia intervened before he could fire off his retort. 'Guys! What's got into you two?' she sighed and shook her head, 'look - we came here to snoop, so let's get snooping.'

Still giving each other the occasional hostile glance, the two men followed her down the corridor.

* * *

Fred watched the tragic love story being played out on the stage. As night had fallen, the vengeful spirits of heartbroken women raised Giselle from her grave - and she joined their number.

Beside Fred, Gunn watched as well - equally enraptured. He was totally caught up in the story - and still marvelling at the way the dancers could move. The two of them mirrored each other, as they watched - leaning slightly forward, their breath shallow and their eyes shining. Both were completely entranced by the magic of it all - and it felt, to both of them, that the real world had melted away.

On her other side, Wesley occasionally glanced towards the stage, but he mostly only had eyes for the woman sitting next to him. He smiled as he noted the tears which stood out in her eyes - sparkling, and the faint flush of her cheeks. It was a thing of wonder, to watch her watch the ballet - to see the way it moved her. It moved him, just to see her this way - and to imagine that one day, soon, that emotion would be for him and him alone. Her eyes would sparkle and her cheeks would flush for him. It felt like the rest of the world had melted away completely.

She moved, slightly, casting a half glance at him, and he worried that she would notice his staring. So, reluctantly, he tore his eyes away from her and looked back at the stage. But he never ceased to be aware of how close she sat beside him, of the way she would brush up against him if she moved, of her perfume and of her shallow breath…

...

Down in his box, the director smiled to himself, as the spirit of Giselle appeared to Albrecht and danced her forgiveness. It was as it always was - it was perfect.

* * *

The three of them crept down the corridor, their footsteps hushed by the thick carpet. Angel paused outside one of the doors - he felt... _something._ He twisted the handle and ushered the others inside. 'This is her dressing room,' he said. His words were heavy and slow.

'The prima ballerina,' Cordelia said - her voice, likewise - had something of a dreamy, almost somnolent quality to it.

'It hasn't changed.'

Doyle looked between the pair of them, in surprise and confusion, 'how do you know?' he asked. His speech was fine - completely normal. But normalcy seemed to have left his companions behind a couple of exits back.

Cordelia sat down at the dressing table, gazing into the gold framed triptych mirror. 'She would wait for him here,' she breathed.

'For who?'

'It's warm, very warm,' Angel said, softly - gazing at Cordelia, with a naked look of hungry longing.

'Really? I'm pretty cold, bud … maybe it's 'cause I don't have a…'

'I feel it,' Cordelia sighed, turning to stare deep into Angel's eyes. Her expression matched his.

'Jacket,' Doyle finished off, 'say - has anyone else noticed you guys are possessed? Can you even hear me? At all?'

'Something happened here,' Angel said - his own eyes fixed firmly on Cordelia - as if there was nobody else in the room - nobody else in the world but them.

'Angel,' she stood up - pushing the seat away from herself - and staring at the vampire.

'Yeah?'

'I want you - to undress me.'

Doyle's eyebrows hit the top of his forehead, 'OK - and this possession has officially stopped bein' fun. We need to get out of here.' He reached out to take his girlfriend's hand - and pull her out of the room. But she shook him off - without even looking. 'Uh - Cordelia, darlin', _hello?_ '

'It's just another costume,' she murmured, but only to Angel, 'I want you to see who I really am. You're the only one who can.' She stared at the vampire, her chest rising and falling as her breathing became deeper - harder. He stared back at her - every inch of him beginning to tingle.

'Nope, nope - not happenin'.' The half demon clapped his hands, as loudly as he could, into Angel's face and the vampire shook his head.

'This isn't…' he said, 'Cordelia,' he licked his lips, 'we're acting this out.'

'Precisely,' Doyle agreed - 'and it's time to stop,' he went and clapped in Cordelia's face - and she shook herself.

As she seemed to come back to herself, she began to look surprised - and then more than a little embarrassed. 'Woah!' she said, 'did I just ask _Angel_ to _undress_ me?'

'Y'did,' Doyle told her, 'yeah.'

But then he was pushed backwards, and he stumbled, as Angel stepped up closer to Cordelia. 'Is that what you want?' he demanded.

'Please ...I..' her voice had taken on that heavy quality again - and her eyes were strange. They glittered, but at the same time they were blank. It was obvious to Doyle that Cordelia was not in the driving seat. He wished he could be so sure about Angel.

'You want me to make love to you right here,' Angel whispered, brushing her face with the back of his hand, caressing her soft skin.

'You know I do.'

'Uhm - we all know I'm never gonna let this happen, right?' Doyle said, looking between them. 'There's no way you're gonna violate Cordy whilst she's not herself.' But he may as well have not been in the room - on the planet - the vampire and the woman stared so deeply into one another's eyes. Cordelia's skin was burning beneath Angel's touch, and her breath came out in gasps. Her heart thundered inside in her chest.

Angel leaned in closer, brushing a strand of hair away from her ear. 'You're afraid.'

'What if he finds us?'

'Actually - I'm already right here, darlin'.' Again - he spoke only for his own benefit.

'I'm not afraid,' Angel said to her. He cupped her face in both his hands, now. 'I'm not afraid of anything.'

'I'm only alive when you are inside of me,' she told him.

They began to kiss, tenderly at first - and then with increasing passion.

Looking like he was about to throw up, Doyle searched the room for something - anything - that would help him pry the two of them apart.


	47. Waiting in the Wings: Part Three

On the stage, the vengeful spirits of the dead women cursed Albrecht to dance until dawn. Giselle, her heart still full of love for him, begged her sisters for his life. But she was dismissed - and he was forced to begin the dance that would lead to his downfall.

* * *

Cordelia was laid out on the sofa. Angel lay above her, holding her in his arms - showering her with kisses - which she returned with increasing intensity. He dropped kisses down her neck, and she lay back and moaned.

Doyle had tried clapping again - but they were too far gone. He had picked up two heavy looking books and slammed them together, but had had no more success. He picked up a hand mirror and shattered it over Angel's head. The glass rained down - but the vampire paid no attention, he kept on caressing Cordelia - kissing her, stroking her, fondling her. Her hands were twined into Angel's hair, now - and she had raised herself up on the sofa, slightly, so she could kiss his neck - just beneath his ear. His right hand slid down towards her breast...

Finally! Doyle found something that might actually work - a necklace on the ballerina's dressing table. It was only small, but size didn't matter. It was what he did with it that would count. He seized it, and pressed it against the side of Angel's face. Smoke began to emanate from where the gold cross bit into the vampire's flesh - and with a hiss - Angel broke away from Cordelia. He looked at where his hand was - and yanked it away with a gasp - as if that too had burned him.

Cordelia sat up, startled - and glanced between the two men , 'oh God!' she said.

'Sorry,' Angel said to her, climbing off.

But now she was in control again, she only had eyes for her boyfriend, 'Doyle?'

'You've been possessed, princess,' he said to her, 'we need to get out o' here.'

Relieved that the half demon did not appear to be upset, or mad, she cast a half glance in Angel's direction, 'yeah - we really _really_ do,' she agreed.

'Yes,' the vampire said, risking a look back at her. They both immediately felt the draw - and the heat - and leaned back in towards each other. Doyle sighed.

Cordelia's breathing was heavy again, 'this isn't getting out of here,' she murmured - not trying to move away.

'I know.' Angel moved in for another kiss.

'Nope. Not again, bud - you've had your chance with Cordy.' Doyle seized his girlfriend's hand and pulled her off the sofa. She didn't shake him off - didn't fight him - but she didn't exactly go willingly, either. And she kept her eyes on Angel the whole time. She was aware of her heart pounding in her chest - and knew he would be, too. But she staggered along behind Doyle, twisting back to be with Angel. Angel followed her - his face never more than an inch from her own - their foreheads practically touching.

As they reached the door, she turned her back on the vampire - hoping to create some distance - to dampen the spirit of - whatever the hell this was - that way. But instead, she found her arm reaching behind her, snaking upwards to wrap around his neck and pull him into a closer embrace. He nuzzled into her neck and she pressed her body against his as hard as she could. 'Doyle - open the damn door!' she said, even as she leaned backwards into the vampire and felt him beneath her. She moaned again - the heat flooding through the entirety of her body - tickling and tingling.

'This is so hard,' Angel murmured, as he kissed down onto her collarbone.

'It really really is,' she agreed, pressing back against him.

Doyle actually dropped the door handle to stare at the pair of them. 'That's disgustin',' he said. Angel wrapped his arms around Cordelia's waist and began to nibble on her ear. She moaned, loudly - and Doyle remembered what he was meant to be doing. 'That's our cue to get the hell outta here,' he said and yanked the door open. The embracing couple stumbled through, and Doyle followed on behind them and slammed the door shut.

...

By the time he turned around, Angel and Cordy had managed to separate themselves - and she, at least, was looking a bit sickened. Angel slumped against the wall and closed his eyes.

'You OK?' Doyle asked Cordelia.

She nodded, though she looked shaken, and pointed at the door, 'what the hell was that place?' she asked.

'There's spirits in there,' Angel told her, 'energy trapped in time, it took us over.'

'And it couldn't have taken Doyle over instead? Why you?' she shuddered, 'well, at least it wears off straight away.' She shuddered again, and then chuckled.

'Yeah it's a good thing,' Angel said. He glanced down - saw Doyle looking at him with an arched eyebrow, and immediately took off his jacket - folding it over his arm and holding it in a strategic position. 'Good thing.'

'Well, the dressing room was a bust,' the half demon said, 'I mean - for some of us…' he raised another eyebrow at Angel, who pressed his jacket closer to his front. 'So what now? - And can I suggest that whatever we do, it doesn't involve the trapped energy of a pair of lovers who speak in prose so cringeworthy it would make Mills and Boon blush?'

'Yeah,' Cordy agreed, 'there were some lines back there that …' she shuddered again, 'kinda left me wanting to wash my mouth out with soap.'

'I dunno, princess… I kinda like when you tell me out of nowhere that you _want me to undress you._ '

She slapped his arm, playfully, and he laughed and wrapped his arm around her. They began to walk off down the corridor. 'You know I would never say anything as cheesy as that, right?' she said.

'Does this mean you're not only alive when… OK, no, it's so gross I'm not even gonna finish that sentence.'

They both laughed, again. Angel followed on behind them - waiting until it was safe to put his jacket back on.

...

'So - is this the right way?' Cordelia asked, as they walked.

'It's _a_ way,' Angel answered, 'this place is a maze. I'm just hoping there's another room.'

'I bet you are, bud,' Doyle replied, he didn't sound overly impressed at the idea of trying another door. He kissed Cordelia on her temple, as they walked along, 'are y' sure you're alright, darlin'?' he asked.

'Why wouldn't I be?'

'Well…' he twisted his mouth into a wry smile, 'I know you've been through some pretty weird and wonderful things in your short life, darlin' - and none of them seem to phase y' or even slow y' down… but gettin' possessed by some ghostie and bein' forced to play out reruns of their sex scenes … well, let's just say things got pretty steamy back there. And - maybe - it was a different kinda violation to the ones you're used to - y'know where monsters try to chop your head off - maybe this one… stuck with y'.'

'I am glad to say that absolutely nothing about that experience _stuck with me_ ,' she retorted. Then she frowned, 'except … _dammit_!'

'What?' both men asked at once. Angel both looked and sounded hopeful. Doyle was done pretending not to notice - and so gave the vampire a dirty look, instead. The small party came to a halt.

'I said something back in that room,' she said, screwing her face up as she thought about it. Her memory was fuzzy - and … inappropriate, in places. It was hard to keep everything straight in her head - and there were certain parts that she didn't want to think about. But nevertheless she was sure she had said something crucial - but it was just beyond her reach - tantalisingly close and yet agonisingly distant. It remained dancing on the fringes of her memory - on the tip of her tongue. 'It was important,' she said to the two men - and looked between them, 'can either of you remember?'

'Uh - you're - you're only alive when - uh -I'm…'

Both Doyle and Cordelia's heads swivelled to look at the vampire, and he quailed under their stare. 'Not that,' Cordelia said.

'Though it is the bit that sticks out in my mind, too,' Doyle was forced to admit.

'Uhm - hey - I said you were afraid!' Angel remembered.

'Yeah - and I said " _what if he finds us here?"_.'

'She had a secret lover,' the vampire surmised.

'They were afraid of someone,' Cordelia said, her eyes widened in realisation, 'and I bet that someone is the reason we are stuck here. We left too soon.'

Angel looked alarmed, 'where? The room?'

'It's a clue,' she insisted, looking between the disbelieving expressions of her two companions, 'it is! Those spirits - or energy - or - or whatever, are still in that room. So we can figure out what happened. We have to go back in.'

'Dear, sweet Jesus, she's lost her mind.' Doyle whistled.

'Go to agree, there, Cor, I am just marvelling at the wrongness of that idea.'

'So what are we gonna do?' She demanded, 'just wander around backstage like Spinal Tap for the next … ever - look, all we have to do is play the scene. Get in. Get out. Listen for clues.'

But Angel was still shaking his head, 'I don't know - I've been possessed by the spirits of dead lovers before. It never ends well.'

'You were evil, then,' Cordelia reminded him.

'Well - yeah - OK … but still, all those emotions. It feels so real. What if - what if that guy had a moment of perfect happiness back in that dressing room, huh? What then?'

' _What?'_ Cordelia looked scandalised, 'Angel! _You're_ not going back into that room with me! _Doyle_ is. Just me and him. Me and Doyle play the scene - you stand in the door and take notes.'

'I'm not havin' the dark avenger take notes on my technique!' Doyle protested, hotly.

'On what we say - dumbass,' Cordelia replied. 'He listens in to what the lovers say to each other - so we can get the whole story. And then he stops us before things get too hot and heavy - because an undead audience does not rank high in my personal fantasies.'

'Oh,' the Irishman thought about if for a moment, 'that's OK, I suppose.'

Angel fought off the waves of disappointment, struggling to conceal them from the others. He didn't like the plan - God knows he didn't want to watch Doyle and Cordelia be … _intimate_ together. But he also couldn't come up with a reason why they shouldn't do it. Or come up with a better plan. So he followed along behind the couple, as they headed back to the dressing room, feeling miserable and more than a little jealous.

* * *

Fred gazed down at the stage - where Giselle was dancing alongside the cursed Albrecht. She was lost to this world of doomed romance. But Wesley was still keenly, painfully aware of her - sitting beside of him. The iron was hot. Now was his moment - as she was swept up in the passion of the ballet - to make his move. Slowly, he reached his hand out towards her, planning to place it gently on her knee.

Still wrapped up in the ballet, wrapped up in the story of the doomed lovers, Gunn felt the overwhelming urge to connect with some part of the real world - to check it was still there. He wanted to know that he wasn't the only one lost in the magic - that the spell which had so deeply ensnared him had cast a wide net - and that others were there with him, sharing this experience - lost, but happy. He too reached his hand out to touch Fred - to physically connect this experience with her.

Entranced by the dancing. Fred saw neither hand snake across her lap. Both were now only millimetres from her skin - almost touching …

'Angel!' she suddenly whispered.

Both hands were immediately withdrawn. 'Huh?' Gunn said.

'And Cordy - they've been gone way too long,' she said to them both.

Wesley nodded, 'you're right,' he agreed, 'we should go find them - come on.'

'But we're gonna miss the end!' Gunn protested, even as the other two stood up. He tore his eyes away from the stage, with regret, and followed them out.

* * *

Doyle and Cordelia stood in the middle of the dressing room - facing each other. Angel lurked in the doorway, his back turned. He didn't want to see this. But nothing much was happening. The two of them just stood there, staring.

'Do you feel anythin' at all?' Doyle asked his girlfriend, 'what is it meant to feel like?'

'Kinda hot - and sweaty. Breathless. And then you're gone,' she told him. 'You're not you anymore - and all you care about is touching the other person, feeling them. It's like your skin is on fire and you can't possibly draw them in close enough, but you have to keep on trying, anyway.'

Over by the door, and unseen by the pair of them, Angel's face took on a wistful sort of expression.

'Wow,' Doyle said, '... I don't feel any o' that.'

'Me neither,' she admitted. 'Maybe we should just leap right into the middle. I want you. Undress me.'

'Yeah, right - you uh - you want us to have sex right now. But you're scared, right?'

'Right! What if he finds us!'

'Um OK…' Doyle glanced around - he was still getting nothing, and so he took a step closer to Cordy. 'Well - I guess - um… I'm not afraid of anythin'.'

'Yeah… and…' she looked like she was sucking on a lemon - her eyes screwed up tightly, and her face turned slightly away, 'I'm only alive when you're inside of me,' she gabbled in a hurry.

Doyle burst out laughing. She slapped him on the arm again. 'Ow!' he protested, chuckling and rubbing his arm, 'you've got a hard hand, Cordelia.'

'This is serious!' she said to him.

'So am I!'

'We need to get our engines revving so we can get in touch with the spirits - find out what's going on!'

'You know,' Angel said from over by the doorway. They both turned to look at him, so they were now standing side by side, and he turned to face them. 'Maybe it only works the once,' he suggested. He took a step into the room, 'maybe the energy is spent or….'

He was cut off from talking, when Cordelia grabbed him and pulled him into a kiss.

Beside her, Doyle rolled his eyes. 'Again?' he asked the room at large. 'What? Can you spirit guys just not see me or somethin'? What's wrong with me? What do you keep on possessin' Tall, Dark and Forehead for?' He sighed, deeply, as - still embracing - Cordelia and Angel stumbled back onto the sofa. He still had the ballerina's cross, for if things went too far - at least - but for now, he simply had to resign himself to taking on Angel's role and taking notes.

* * *

Fred and the two men headed down the stairs and came to the body of the unconscious security guard. 'Well, at least Angel left us a trail to follow,' Gunn noted. They stepped over the prone guard, and went backstage - finding themselves in the endless corridor. With an uncertain glance at each other, they headed off. Behind them there was a quiet sound - a strange mixture of crying and laughter - and then two shapes slipped away.

* * *

The director was up in his box. Giselle was dancing a solo and the beauty of her movements made it feel as if the whole world had fallen still. Nothing existed except this perfect moment. But the moment was interrupted by a pair of white gloved hands suddenly gripping the back of his chair. There was that same sound of crying laughter.

The director sighed. 'Take care of it,' he said, 'deal with them. I can't be bothered right now.' The hands were withdrawn, and the director was left alone. He had never taken his eyes off Giselle.

* * *

Angel lay Cordelia back down on the sofa - covering her neck with kisses. 'This is wrong,' she breathed.

'Damn right it is,' Doyle muttered. He was leaning against the dressing table, his arms folded across his chest and one eyebrow raised, sardonically. The cross was clutched in his fist. 'We better get to the good info before you guys get to the good stuff…' he gripped the cross tighter, 'or else I will use this baby.'

But - just as before - the couple on the sofa were completely unaware of his presence. Locked in a world of nothing but themselves. 'Hush,' Angel tried to quiet Cordy's fears by kissing her lips, tenderly.

'You don't know him,' she gasped, when he broke away, 'he has power.'

'The power to do this?' Angel asked, pulling away from her and tracing a finger down her inside leg, whilst gripping her firmly with his other hand. She moaned and writhed beneath him.

Doyle, his arms still folded, looked up at the ceiling, 'y'know - my "understanding boyfriend of the year" medal had better be in the post,' he said, ''cause I am _owed_.'

'Stefan,' Cordelia gasped, between kisses, 'his power is unnatural.'

'Oh, here we go,' the Irishman switched his attention back to the embracing couple on the sofa - fighting the urge to smash something heavy over Angel's head - and concentrating on listening instead.

'He could…'

'What, kill us?'

'Worse,' Cordelia said.

Angel shook his head, and stared deep into her eyes. 'Kurskov owns the company,' he said to her, 'he doesn't own you.'

'Alright - we have a name! Can we stop now?'

But it was not meant to be...

'He doesn't know that,' Cordelia was saying. 'He thinks I'm his.' She pushed Angel upwards, and followed him - so they were both sitting up. But their faces remained only millimetres apart, and she breathed her words to him. 'That I dance for him. He's nothing but a deluded fan. He thinks I love him.'

'Come away with me,' Angel said to her. 'Now. Tonight. We'll go where even _he_ can't find us.' But Cordelia resisted - everything she had worked for was here - at the company. 'You can still dance,' he assured her, but she didn't know … maybe someday…

'Don't,' he whispered, 'don't make promises.'

'Y'know? I like this part,' Doyle remarked - unheeded by both of them, 'all this talkin', no kissin', handy clues. I think we're done here.'

'Help me,' Cordelia murmured to Angel, 'help me to be not afraid.' He pushed her back down and began to smother her with kisses.

'Yep - we're done,' Doyle said, getting down from his perch on the dressing table, 'time to use the amazing Mr. Cross.'

* * *

Fred, Gunn and Wes walked down the corridors - not daring to go more than a few steps away from each other, they tried their best to navigate the maze - and investigate every avenue. 'This is very not right,' Gunn said.

'Do you hear that?' Fred asked, looking around.

'There's something here,' Wesley agreed.

Behind them - unnoticed - two dark shapes flitted past. But the small group were too busy concentrating on the moaning sound coming from somewhere nearby. 'Someone's in pain,' Wesley said.

The next moan was deeper, more throaty. Fred didn't looked convinced. 'Either that, or someone's in fun,' she said.

* * *

Doyle had the cross ready, and approached the sofa - as Angel and Cordy continued to writhe and moan. 'I'm gonna have to interrupt your happy time, here, bud, ' he said to Angel, 'I'd say I'm sorry, but …'

He looked up. 'Oh.' And then he was knocked down by a hard right to the jaw. He fell to the floor, hit his head on the leg of the dressing table, and passed out.

Angel pulled Cordelia's dress down. All the way to her navel, and covered her bare skin in kisses. It was hot beneath his lips - and she tensed and whimpered in ecstasy every time he touched her. 'Oh no,' she gasped. Then, she opened her eyes - and saw what was standing there, 'Oh no!' she said.

Angel straightened up, to see what she was looking at, just in time to get knocked to the floor by one of the dark figures in the white gloves. Cordelia peeked over the back of the sofa, and watched as a man in a grey 'comedy' mask punched Angel. 'Oh thank God!' she said, and then saw Doyle lying unconscious on the floor. 'Doyle!' she squealed. She hopped off the sofa and ran to his side. 'Doyle? Sweetie?'

He began to stir. He groaned and opened his eyes - which widened in startlement when he realised exactly what he was looking at. 'Uh - Cordelia - we're in public!'

She looked down and her own eyes widened, as she realised she was still half naked. She pulled the straps of her dress back onto her shoulders, and then helped Doyle sit up, 'you OK?' she asked.

He nodded, holding a hand against the sore spot on his head. 'What's goin' on?' They both watched as Angel wrestled with the guy in the Greek theatre mask.

'Well, Angel and I…'

'Got naked?'

'Kinda,' she blushed, 'but then we were interrupted - thank God - by this guy. So… presumably that's what happened to the prima ballerina and her love monkey. They got interrupted - either by Kurskov or one of his lackeys… so I think we're done here.'

'That's a relief.'

'You know - you have been totally amazing about this whole thing.'

'I know.'

She smiled and leaned in to kiss him - but then screamed, as Angel came charging right at her. But the vampire launched himself over the top of her - and tackled the minion that had been sneaking up on the young couple, from behind.

* * *

The others followed the sounds of the fight. 'Now that sounds like less fun,' Gunn said. They didn't notice as one of Kurskov's minions - this one in a 'tragedy' mask - slipped behind them. It drew out its sword. Gunn screamed, as the sharp blade slid into him from behind.

Fred span around, at the noise, and watched him fall. 'Charles!' she cried.


	48. Waiting in the Wings: Part Four

Gunn elbowed his assailant in the face - but then staggered, as he began to feel the pain of his wound. Another theatre minion was facing down Wesley.

The British man leapt back to avoid it's sword, 'Fred, stay between us,' he commanded.

But there was no 'us'... Gunn had collapsed, and was now slumped on the floor, leaning heavily against the wall. Fred picked up a heavy prop, wielded it like a blunt instrument, and walloped the tragedy minion who had stabbed Gunn. it dropped his sword, and she threw it to Wes. He caught it and turned back to fence with his own comedy opponent.

'Can you handle the other?' he called back to her. But, as he glanced over his shoulder, he saw the tiny woman repeatedly thumping the minion about the head with her heavy, improvised weapon. It fell to the floor - and she continued to beat it, savagely. 'Never mind then,' Wes said - and faced his own foe, once more. 'Just us,' he said and launched into an offensive, driving his opponent backwards, and out of sight of the others.

* * *

Doyle had gone demon face and launched himself at the laughing comedy minion. They traded blows, but when the creature drew out a sharp stiletto - the half demon hastily backed away, turning around to search for a weapon. Cordelia, who had been lurking uneasily on the edge, picked up one of the pillows from the sofa.

'Oh that'll work,' Doyle said, sounding exasperated, 'kill him with a cushion!' But she threw it hard - and succeeded in knocking the sharp blade out of the theatre demon's hand.

'Scratch that, princess - thank you!' Doyle said, and he launched himself back at the grey faced figure. He head butted it - gouging it with his spikes - and then followed up by a hard blow to the face. Cordelia picked up the fallen stiletto.

Meanwhile, Angel was wrestling with a tragedy minion. The demon pulled out a stiletto of its own and rammed it into the vampire's heart. Angel glanced down at where it stuck out from him. 'Thanks,' he said, ripping it out and plunging it right back into the heart of the demon. The creature screamed and died.

He then turned, and saw Doyle still fighting his own minion. 'Move,' he yelled. Doyle backed away, at once. Cordelia threw the blade she had picked up from the floor towards the vampire. He caught it and buried it in the second demon's neck. It fell to the floor, and the three team members looked at each other. The two living members were breathing heavily after their exertions. 'Are you guys OK?' Angel asked.

'Yeah,' Cordelia nodded, 'but we need to get out of here.'

'Why? Do you think they're not dead?'

'No - you just looked really hot whilst you did that.'

'Oh.'

Doyle rolled his eyes, 'seriously?' he asked. He morphed back into his human face, 'well, let's get out of here, then - 'cause next time I have to separate you two, I'm gonna borrow one of these guys' swords to do it.'

'You can't kill me by stabbing me with a sword,' Angel said, pointing to the stab wound in his heart to make his point.

'No,' Doyle agreed - nodding his head, slowly, 'but I can hurt you like hell when I jab it up your arse.'

Angel was quiet for a moment - and then, 'OK, let's go.' The three of them scurried from the room.

* * *

Wesley fenced with his comedy minion. It chuckled the whole time but, with a bit of fancy footwork, the watcher was able to parry its blows and then run it through. 'Who's laughing now?' he asked. The minion chuckled, weakly. 'Well, I suppose you are - but I still win.' He turned to go and find the others.

* * *

Fred had dispatched her own minion, abandoned her blunt weapon, and rushed back to Gunn's side. She used her stole to wrap around his wound and stem the bleeding. 'That's OK,' Gunn said to her, 'that should hold.' She released a shaky breath, and looked away from him. Her whole tiny frame was quivering. 'Are you OK?' he checked, 'are you hurt?'

'I'm fine,' she said, turning back to him, 'I just thought …' she took a deep breath, and looked away again. Tears began to blur in her eyes, and her lip trembled. 'I'm sorry - I shouldn't fall apart like this.' She sniffed. 'Cordy has to do this sort of thing for Doyle all the time - it's just…' she took another deep, raggedy breath.

The injured man began to smile, 'you're not worried I'm gonna die are you?' he asked.

'Charles, don't even…' She couldn't even bear to look at him, as she spoke.

He leaned his head back against the wall - and rolled his eyes heavenward. 'And all I ask - as the light is dimming - is for one. Last. Kiss.' He declaimed, and then began to chuckle.

Fred did not join in. 'You think that's funny?' she asked. There was still a trace of a wobble in her voice.

'It's just a scratch!' he assured her.

'But I thought it was …I...' she looked away again, her breathing still deep and shaky. She desperately tried to blink away the tears, which threatened to fall. 'Hey,' Gunn reached out and touched her face, gently. She turned back to face him - and he saw the tears shining in her eyes. He pulled her closer to him, and held her; stroking her back soothingly, whilst she fought to compose herself. When he felt her stop shaking, he pulled back and tried to look her in the eye. 'You were really that worried for me?'

But she refused to make eye contact. 'You must think I'm such an idiot. Cordy...'

'Has the hide of a rhino. Nothing gets to that girl. But if you care this much…' his voice became quieter, 'then the wound is definitely deep.'

'The light is dimming?' she replied, leaning in towards him.

'And all I ask,' he reached out and cupped her face with his hand. She didn't pull away, 'is one last…' he closed the distance between them, and pressed his lips against her own. She wrapped her arms around him - and returned the embrace.

...

Behind them - alone and unnoticed - Wesley watched them kiss. His face was a mask of heartbreak. He turned and walked away.

...

He stumbled down the corridor, dragging the tip of the sword across the floor. His legs felt like lead, his heart felt like ice, but the tears in his eyes burned like fire … and he felt the waves of despair and sadness crash over him - followed closely by the hot wave of jealousy. The envy intensified - burning - and he dropped to his knees, feeling the heat of the emotions pass over him. He stared off into the distance - but his eyes were curiously blank.

* * *

Up in his box, Kurskov watched Giselle dance. She danced for him alone - now. He had made it so, and now she was his - forever.

* * *

Fred helped Gunn get to his feet. They remained with their arms wrapped around each other, smiling, as Angel, Cordelia, and Doyle came around the corner. 'Are you guys alright?' Angel asked.

'Charles got stabbed,' Fred told them.

Cordy hurried over to Gunn, and lifted his shirt to take a look. 'A couple of stitches worth,' he said to her.

She smiled, 'I'll patch you back up properly when we manage to get the hell out of this place.'

'Cordy - your tag is showing,' Fred said to her, tucking her tag back inside her dress.

Cordy blushed and glanced at her boyfriend, who just rolled his eyes. 'It's been a weird sorta night,' he said.

She blushed deeper. 'But we managed to find some stuff out,' she said. She filled the other two in on the secrets they had learned in the dressing room - about the prima ballerina, her secret lover, and the jealous Count Kurskov.

'He has some kind of power,' Angel supplied.

'He was a wizard,' another voice cut in. They all turned and saw Wesley standing at the end of the next corridor. He still held his sword and his face was … there were so many conflicting emotions - and none of them good. His voice was as heavy and as strained as his expression. 'He was obsessed with the girl. When he found her with the other man - he went insane with jealous rage - pulled her out of time.' He began to walk towards them, slowly, 'out of any reality beyond _his_ theatre, _his_ company. He swore she would dance for him forever.'

Fred watched him uncertainly, she had never seen Wesley like this - apart from… but she didn't really want to think about that incident. She spent a lot of time carefully not thinking about that incident. 'How did you…?'

'I - ah - I hit a hotspot too,' he confessed.

Doyle whistled, 'so it really is just me that doesn't get possessed then?' he said. He looked at Cordelia, 'why d'ya think that is? Is there something wrong with me?' He suddenly looked offended, 'd'y' think it's 'cause I'm _short?_ '

'I think the reasons might run a little deeper than that, sweetie,' Cordelia said - staring at the strange expression on the watcher's face - and glancing back to note how close Gunn and Fred were standing to each other. She thought she was beginning to understand what was going on.

'So - are we trapped here?' Gunn asked. He looked around, worried. But Wesley thought perhaps not. A temporal shift, such as the one they were experiencing, could not simply exist. It needed to be maintained. It took power and energy. Concentration.

'So, what? We break Kurskov's concentration and no more labyrinth?' Doyle asked.

'How do we do that?' Angel glanced between the watcher and their new puzzle solving expert. 'How do we distract him, or overload him, or…'

'Well, I imagine _that_ requires a lot of energy,' Wesley replied, nodding down at the floor, where the tragedy minion Fred had killed lay. It was beginning to sit up and - as it did so - it began to shake and vibrate - and then it split into two. There was now a comedy and a tragedy demon - where there had only been one before - and the strange mixture of laughter and crying started up, again.

Angel pounced on them both, before they were properly back on their feet, grabbed the pair of them in a headlock and snapped their necks. They dropped to the floor - dead. And then, once more, they began to shake and split in two. Now there were four.

'The more we kill, the more he makes,' Fred breathed.

'Yeah - but look!' Cordelia pointed down the corridor, where the heavy carpets, flocked wallpaper and gas lamps seemed to shimmer and dissolve; revealing, only for a moment, the cinder-blocks of the modern day backstage area.

'His energy is draining,' Wesley said. The corridor remade itself in the image of the 19th century version. 'Angel - try to find the way to the stage - the Count will be watching.'

'I bet _he_ has a box,' the vampire muttered, as he walked away from the group.

Wesley put an arm out to stop him. 'Find his power source and destroy it. We'll try to loosen his hold.' Angel nodded and walked away. As he did, another minion came haring towards them. The vampire kicked out at it, breaking its neck, and then continued on his way.

Cordelia scanned the terrain - looking for something … 'over here,' she said pointing to an alcove, 'they can't surround us.' The team hurried over to the strategic spot. She robbed the dead minion of his sword and stiletto - passing the smaller blade to Gunn. Doyle morphed back into his spikes.

'You two,' Wesley looked from Fred, to Gunn, and then back to Fred… there was a long pause. 'Stay close together, I'll take point.' He turned his back on them and raised his sword.

Cordelia joined him, her own sword raised just as Angel had trained her. Doyle stood beside her - weaponless, except for his demon abilities. 'I hope you're in the killing mood,' she said to them.

'I should do alright,' Wesley replied.

The first regenerated minion launched their attack.

* * *

Angel walked quietly through the labyrinthine passageways. He turned this way and that - but could find no way through the maze.

* * *

Cordelia swung her sword and felled the minion. It dropped to the ground. Doyle took its sword from it, but a moment later, it split in two. They rushed at the team. And this time it was Wesley and Doyle that knocked the theatre demons back. Again they split…

* * *

The corridor around Angel began to flicker and fade. He looked around. It righted itself… but he knew that the gang were doing as promised, they were draining Kurskov's energy - overloading him by forcing him to create more minions.

* * *

The whole team were armed now, and were working as a finely honed unit - slashing at one theatre demon and then falling back to allow another team member room for their own attack. The number of minions was ever increasing, but - blocked into the small space that Cordelia had chosen - there was not enough room for them to attack at once and overwhelm the team. The gang kept on fighting, and then stepping back, and then fighting again - taking each attack as it came.

* * *

The wall right beside Angel flickered. He reached out to touch it, his hand passed through. After a moment's hesitation, he leapt through the wall and found himself in the wings of the stage. A ballerina exited the stage and, as she danced into the wings - out of sight of the audience, she melted into nothingness.

Further upstage - waiting in the wings - just behind the curtain, stood Giselle. She was all alone - staring out onto the stage whilst the women of the corps de ballet danced around Albrecht.

Quietly, Angel approached her. 'Hello,' he said. She turned to look at him - startled. He had never been there before, he was new.

'Actually - I'm pretty old,' he told her. 'I've seen you dance.'

She looked away from him, back out to the stage. 'Everyone sees me.'

'It was "Giselle" then, as well.'

'Always.'

The vampire stood beside the ballerina and looked out with her. Across the stage he could see Kurskov in his box. 'I know what's happening,' he told her, 'Kurskov is punishing you.'

'He made me. He owns me. And now I dance only for him.'

Beside Angel, the air shivered, as a line of ballerinas materialised and danced out onto the stage. 'Do you really believe that?' he asked her.

'It doesn't matter. I dance. I wait here, and then I dance again. That's all.'

He watched the ballerinas on the stage for a moment. It was just as it had been when he had seen it with Darla and his old family - over a hundred years ago. 'Is this enough?' he asked her - a hundred years, night after night, performing the same piece? 'What about Stefan?'

She tore her gaze away from the stage, and looked up at him. Her eyes were large, and luminous with tears. She took a deep breath. 'I waited too long.' She had had a hundred years of regret - an entire century to dwell - and then to try and forget. She knew where she had made her mistake.

She should have left with him when he had offered. Lived a life of freedom - of love. But it meant turning her back on everything she had ever wanted, everything she had worked so hard for. She could not dance if she were hiding. If she fled, then Kurskov would look for her. And if she danced - he would find her. To disappear would mean to leave her world behind. And she had hesitated. Because all she had ever wanted was to dance. She shook her head, sorrowfully, 'I lost everything that mattered,' she told the vampire, 'and now all I do is wait.'

'You dance,' he replied.

But once more, she shook her head. There was a section - she told him - in the first act, during the courtship dance - where she lost her footing. Her ankle would turn, her foot would slip. Albrecht would hold her up. Every single time. She glanced up at the Count's box. 'He doesn't even notice - he doesn't know ballet that well. But always, at the same moment - I slip. It isn't just the same ballet,' she turned and looked at Angel, 'it's the same performance.' He stared at her. 'I don't dance,' she told him, turning back to the stage, 'I echo.'

She was quiet for a moment, and then she turned back to the vampire - longing in her eyes, 'please - can you make it stop?'

He looked at her for a moment - and then reached his hand out to the stage. It vanished, as it passed the edge of the wings. Just like the other dancers did when they exited the stage. He could not enter that stage - not yet. 'I can help you,' he said to her, 'but you have to do something.'

'What?'

'Change the ending - dance something new.'

She shook her head. She couldn't do that. But Angel insisted she could. Kurskov was losing control. For a moment, the backstage area dissolved revealing the modern surroundings - the gang were clearly still putting up a good fight: draining his energy; damaging his concentration. 'You have to take to the stage,' Angel said, 'it's not too late - you can change things.'

The prima ballerina looked at Angel, and then went en pointe and entered the stage. She crossed over to where Albrecht lay, prone on the floor, in a _pas de bourree couru_ \- her steps even and graceful. But she glanced back at the vampire waiting in the wings, even as she danced into position. She circled Albrecht, and moved towards him but then - with one final glance at Angel - straightened up and backed away - striking a brand new pose.

'No!' Up in his box, Kurskov jumped to his feet and glared down at her. She began to dance again - making up the steps, as she went along. The body of Albrecht shimmered and dissolved. She stopped, and stared defiantly at Kurskov, taking up a new position.

And that was enough to allow Angel to access the stage. He ran out from behind the curtain, dashed across the stage and then leapt into Kurskov's box in two almighty bounds. He grabbed hold of the Count. 'Where's your power centre?'

'How dare you!'

'I'll guess,' the vampire said, and used his fist to smash the red jewel in the Russian cross.

A wave of blue light rushed out from the destroyed ruby, washing over the auditorium and onto the stage. Washing over the prima ballerina.

* * *

Backstage, it washed over the minions and they disappeared. The gang stumbled, as they swung their swords at nothingness … and then stared around at the cinder blocks and electric lights of the modern backstage area.

* * *

On the stage, the ballerina stared up at Angel. He nodded to her - and she sank to the floor elegantly, folding herself over her outstretched leg into a graceful bow. Then she shimmered - and like Albrecht and the minions - disappeared.

'You have no right!' Kurskov cried - staring at the now empty stage in horror.

'Save it,' Angel said.

'She was my love. She danced only for _me_!'

'Yeah. You love her that much?' he hauled back and punched Kurskov in the chin, dropping him to the ground, 'start a website.' He turned and walked out of the box.

* * *

Back at the hotel, Cordelia was patching up Gunn. 'Is the pain bad?' she asked him.

He smiled at Fred, who sat beside him, 'what pain?' he asked.

Wesley watched them from a distance … before turning and leaving without saying goodnight.

...

Angel and Doyle were in the lobby - their conversation was an awkward one. 'I'm sorry,' Angel was saying, 'I don't know why the spirits chose me … but you have to know….'

'I know,' Doyle said folding his arms, and holding eye contact with the vampire - making it perfectly plain what he knew.

Angel dropped eye contact and stared at his feet, which he shuffled. 'What I mean is … I would never… as far as I'm concerned - we just need to forget the whole thing ever happened.'

'If that works for Cordy, then that works for me,' Doyle replied, 'but the real question, bud - is does that work for you? And what happens if it doesn't?'

'I - uh…'

'What's going on?' First aid duties complete, Cordelia approached the two men and slid her arm through Doyle's.

He glanced at her. 'We were just talking about … earlier.'

'Oh,' she looked down and blushed. 'You know I'd rather not - whatever was seen, whatever was …' she laughed an embarrassed laugh, 'well, I think it might just be one of those experiences we're all better off repressing.'

'Exactly,' Angel said in a hurry, 'that's just what I was saying. I wanna wipe the whole thing from my mind.'

'Why?' Cordelia looked taken aback, 'was it - like - _disgusting_?'

'Kinda was from where I was standin',' Doyle muttered. She nudged him.

'No - of course not,' Angel said - he was getting flustered. 'It's just - my feelings for you are…' Doyle raised an eyebrow at him, '...friendship feelings,' he finished, lamely, 'and I don't want anything we went through tonight getting in the way of our relationship - current … or future.'

Doyle gave him another hard look. But Cordelia was nodding along, 'wise words, indeed,' she said, 'some relationships are just too important to over-complicate - or let petty little things get in the way.'

'Little?' Angel asked, looking hurt.

Doyle snickered.

Cordelia chose to ignore them both. 'I'm exhausted,' she said to her boyfriend, 'crash here tonight?'

'Suits me,' Doyle answered - and they said their goodnights, and went up to the half demon's room.

Angel watched them go. 'Nightcap?' Lorne asked, appearing beside him - offering a whisky.

'God yes.' He took the drink, and downed it.

'Rough night?' Lorne asked him, 'the magic of the ballet not do anything to resolve your feelings?'

'Not much.'

'So - what will you do about Cordelia?'

'I don't know,' Angel sighed. 'How's Connor?'

* * *

Cordelia and Doyle lay in their bed, wrapped in each others arms. 'Are you OK?' Cordelia asked him.

'Why wouldn't I be?'

'Because I sort of cheated on you tonight.'

'That wasn't you,' he assured her, absentmindedly stroking her hair.

She glanced up at him, from her position resting against his chest. 'I know - but you still saw what you saw.'

'And if I never have to see you mack on Angel again, I certainly won't be complainin',' he said to her, 'but - and I'll admit I didn't like it - I know it wasn't your fault. Anyway - you're an actress. Once you're a famous movie star you're gonna have to do loads of romantic scenes with men who aren't me - and then millions of people will watch 'em . It's just something I'm gonna have to get used to.'

She laughed. 'I think we both know that is never gonna happen,' she replied.

'Well - maybe, maybe not… but about tonight? It's you I'm worried about.'

'Why?' she frowned. 'You can't think I liked it?'

'No,' he chuckled, 'that's why I'm worried - that you're not comfortable with what went on.'

She sighed, 'I guess I'll just have to learn to live with it.'

'I guess,' he dropped a kiss onto the top of her head. 'There's somethin' I don't understand though.'

'Is it how I ended up half naked? 'Cause I swear I don't know, either.'

'No,' he chuckled again, 'there were three spirits in that place - at least - because Wesley got taken over, as well. How come I got left out? How come neither Stefan or Kurskov used me to play out their little history?'

Cordelia wriggled, so her head was back on the pillow and she was level with Doyle again. A frown was playing on her face. 'From what I know about spirits - they possess the person they identify with the most - not the person you might think is most likely. You know Angel talked about getting possessed by the spirits of dead lovers before? I told you that story, once, remember? A boy shot his teacher, who he was in love with… and when it came to it, the boy possessed Buffy - not Angel, because she felt she had destroyed Angel when she slept with him and he lost his soul. She felt like she'd destroyed the thing she loved in a moment of blind passion - like the boy.'

'So?'

'Kurskov couldn't possess you,' she kissed the end of his nose. 'His driving force was obsession - and jealousy. But you … you watched me make out with Angel and you didn't even get angry.'

'Well - not with you, anyway. It wasn't your fault.'

'Exactly - Kurskov, he was only interested in possessing her - he saw her as a literal object of his desire. But you _love_ \- and are very much loved in return. Possession and envy just are not factors that motivate you. His spirit could never take hold of your soul.' She frowned again, 'but that doesn't explain why Stefan wouldn't touch you with a ten foot pole.'

'I think maybe it does,' the half demon replied, 'his love was secret - and forbidden - mine is wide out in the open. We got nothin' in common.'

'But Angel has a secret love?' She sounded disbelieving.

'That he does.'

'Is this about Buffy? _Still?_ '

'No - not Buffy...' He decided to change the topic to a safer one. 'So how come the ballerina picked you to possess? What do you have in common with her?'

'Well - I was kinda the only other person there … unless you wanted her to possess you? Spirits can go cross sex.'

He pretended to think about it for a moment. 'No,' he finally concluded, 'Angel wasn't wearin' his long, billowy coat tonight.'

Cordelia giggled, 'he just isn't the same without it.' They fell quiet - and the only sound was their breathing. A long while later, Cordy spoke again. 'Doyle? If it isn't Buffy? Who is Angel's secret love?'

But Doyle pretended not to hear her, and feigned sleep - keeping his breathing even, his chest rising and falling steadily, until eventually he really got there. Cordelia, however, stayed awake for a long while - staring into the dark and trying to figure out the answer to this new mystery.

* * *

A couple of floors above her - Angel was also lying awake. He had promised to blank the evening from his mind: the memory of her kisses, her touch, her warm skin … and the heady feeling that she wanted him, desperately. But he had lived for over two centuries, and his memory was perfect; he had no idea how to go about forgetting this one evening...


	49. Couplet: Part One

_Cordelia danced away from him. He tried to hold onto her hand - but she just smiled and pulled away. The drokken came out of nowhere - all fur and fangs and hot breath. It pounced on Cordy and dragged her to the ground, before he could get to her. She screamed out. And then Angel was there - he was laughing - he swung his sword at the drokken and cut its head clean from its shoulder. The decapitated head rolled along the ground and came to a stop at Doyle's feet - where it turned into Connor. The baby began to cry, and Doyle picked him up. 'Angel… the baby-'_

_But Angel wasn't paying attention. He had helped Cordelia up to her feet and was now stood, holding her hand - gazing into her eyes. 'You dance for me, now,' he said to her._

' _I'm not supposed to…'_

' _Hush.' He leaned in towards her and kissed her, softly, on the lips - cutting off her words. 'All's fair in love and war,' he said._

_Doyle stared at the vampire kissing his girlfriend, and then down into the red, screwed up face of the crying baby, 'Angel…'_

The vision pain slammed into his head - and he was jerked awake. The force of the images pushed him upright in bed, and he sat there - gasping - as wave after wave of pain crashed into his skull, leaving its mystical message behind.

Cordelia had not yet fallen asleep - and she, too, sat up when he did. She reached out and stroked his hair, tenderly. 'What did you see?' she asked him. Her voice was as soothing as her hand.

'Just a demon,' he said, kneading his forehead with the tips of his fingers, 'needs killin'.'

'Shall I ring everybody - get them back here?'

He shook his head, 'nah - we got time, it isn't risin' up til the afternoon. We can deal with it in the morning.'

'OK - if you're sure.' She kissed him, briefly, on the lips and then lay back down. He slumped down next to her, and she immediately wrapped her arms around him - holding him to her breast and continuing to stroke his hair. 'Is your head OK?' she asked, 'is your headache gone?'

'Yeah - the pain is gone,' he told her - and he drifted back to sleep, wrapped tightly in her warm embrace.

* * *

Angel got up the next morning when he heard Connor beginning to stir. He went to check on the baby - and then went over to the kitchenette in his suite to heat up a bottle. A minute later, he had his son clasped in his arms and was sat back on the bed, feeding him, 'is that good?' he said, 'yeah - that's good - isn't it? You like your bottle.' He yawned. Last night had been a busy one - and a late one. But Connor seemed unperturbed.

Once the baby had finished, and fallen back asleep, Angel placed him back in his crib and then went to get dressed. As soon as he opened his closet door, he was hit full in the face with the scent of Cordelia. It was like she was right there in the room with him. ' _What?'_ He glanced around in confusion - but no, he was alone - it was just the smell of Cordy that was present.

He peered back into the closet. His tux, from the previous night, was hanging up there - and he realised that her perfume must be clinging to that. He stared for a moment and then - almost against his own will - he took the jacket off its hanger and hugged it tight, inhaling deeply. He could almost feel her. The delicate fragrance of her perfume, wafting through the air - and then something underneath that, something that was indefinably … her. Her skin, her hair, the heat of her body as she flushed under his kisses … it was all there, in the jacket.

...This probably wasn't the best way to start the day. Reluctantly, he hung the jacket back up, and got dressed.

* * *

When he came downstairs, carrying Connor, he found Cordelia and Doyle out in the lobby. Cordy had her sketch pad out, and they both had cups of coffee. 'No - it was kind of a blueish, greenish, slimy, grey colour,' Doyle was saying.

'Well that narrows it down,' she remarked wryly.

'It's skin was all bumpy - and had these tusk things that hung downwards from its temples … no, no they were straight - not curved. And then there were two more shooting upwards from it's shoulders. It was about the same size as Angel. And it had red eyes.'

'Slow down!' Cordelia said to him, rubbing out the first set of tusks and drawing them back in, straight, 'I can't get all this when you jibber so fast.'

'What's going on?' Angel asked, he squinted at Cordy's drawing, 'Doyle have a vision of that thing?'

'In the disgustin', spiny flesh,' Doyle told him. 'We need to kill it this afternoon.'

'OK - hey…' he looked at them both, a little uncertain. 'About last night…'

'We're moving on,' Cordelia said, not looking up from her drawing.

'Yep from ballet ghosts to spiny demons - the fun never stops happenin',' her boyfriend agreed.

They were not allowing any room for further discussion of the previous night's events and - feeling a little disappointed - Angel took the hint. 'Right - so - uh - no need to uh - no need to …'

'No need to nothin' except kill today's demon.'

'Right.' He jigged Connor in his arms, gave the couple one last, disappointed, look - and then left them alone, walking over to Wes' office.

...

The boss looked up from his desk, as the vampire arrived, 'ah Angel - excellent, there's something I wish to discuss with you.'

'Is it the demon? I was just talking to Cordy and Doyle and…'

'No - no, we have time on the demon - it's rather…' he watched as Angel put Connor down in his bassinet, 'well it's rather the fact of him. Recent events have all taken us aback somewhat. We have need to adjust to the new circumstances. There are still so many questions...'

Angel glanced out towards the lobby. 'About what his power means? You're suspicious.'

'Cautious, might be a better word for it.'

'You think he's evil - he's gonna use the word jumble to end the world or something?'

'Um,' Wesley blinked, 'No - I don't think Connor is going to use the word jumble to end the world.' He spoke like he thought Angel had lost his mind.

Angel looked up from his son, 'oh - we're talking about _Connor?_ '

'Yes - who did you think we were talking about?'

The vampire, once again, looked back towards the lobby, where Doyle was still describing his vision for Cordelia. 'Nobody,' he said. 'So what's the problem?'

'He shouldn't exist.'

Angel looked annoyed. 'His birth was foretold,' he pointed out, 'how many people can say that?'

Wesley nodded. He steepled his index fingers and placed them on the bridge of his nose - so his bowed head was resting on them. 'He has a part to play, it's true,' he said slowly, 'but we still don't know what that part is.' He sighed, and looked up at the worried father in front of him. 'Angel, we can't be afraid to ask the questions. Because your enemies - _his_ enemies - certainly won't be.'

'You're right, we should be prepared.'

Wesley looked pleased and began to outline his plan. The Nyazian prophecy had been stolen, true, but ancient sources tended to accumulate scholarship. Commentaries were written over the years. He hoped that he might be able to locate a … cliff notes version of the Nyazian prophecy. 'A Nyazian prophecy for dummies - as Cordelia might call it,' he finished up.

'You think someone else might have already done the work for us?'

'That is my hope. I've been looking into it - I just thought you should know.'

Angel nodded his head, 'I wanna be involved, completely - keep me updated?' He picked up the bassinet and carried Connor back out to the counter. He poured himself a cup of coffee - and watched Doyle and Cordy from a distance. They were laughing, even as they worked on getting a photofit of their latest creature feature. They always seemed to be laughing. Doyle never made Cordy cry…

'And how is my precious poppet this morning?' Lorne asked, arriving at his side.

'I'm fine,' Angel replied, not taking his eyes off the young couple.

Lorne gave him a look, 'I was talking to the baby.'

'Oh.'

'Come to Uncle Lorne, let me look at you,' the green demon picked Connor up and began to bounce him. Connor chuckled. 'So do you want me to pretend that I don't know what you're doing?' Lorne asked, keeping his eyes on the baby.

'What?... no... I'm not doing anything.'

'Uhuh. It's funny how not doing anything - and being all Joe stalker - look exactly alike.'

'I'm not…'

'You can't do this to yourself, Angelcakes,' Lorne said kindly, 'or to them. I told you already - either make a play for Cordelia - or get over her, but don't sit here mooning over her - torturing yourself and creeping them the heck out.'

'You think I can just make a play for her?' Angel said. 'You don't think Doyle'll…'

'All is fair in love and war, Cherry Pie,' the Host reminded him. 'But you have to remember - just because you throw your hat in the ring, doesn't necessarily mean she'll choose you. A happy ending is guaranteed to no one.'

* * *

Gunn smiled across the table at Fred, watching her eat the last of her pancakes. 'It's funny,' he said.

She swallowed, and looked confused, 'the way that I chew?'

His grin grew broader, and he shook his head. 'No. Until that kiss last night, I would have thought you and Wesley had a thing for each other.' He still couldn't quite believe that she had chosen him. Hadn't been entirely convinced, until he picked her up for breakfast that morning, that the whole previous evening hadn't just been some wonderful dream.

She looked away at his words, seeming embarrassed. 'Wesley? Oh no - we're just good friends.' She had no idea how Charles could have got that idea into his head, at all. The British man was just not her type - in so many ways. But there was a darkness to him, that she had seen, that did not leave her with any desire to get to know him in a more intimate way. Charles, on the other hand was just so sweet - so light, in comparison. She needed that. After Pylea - after everything… she needed his openness, and his honesty… and his light.

They smiled at each other for a long time, gazing into each other's eyes. But then Fred began to fidget. 'We should probably go,' she said. 'People might start to talk.'

That made Gunn laugh, 'why would they?' The two of them had been doing breakfast for weeks now, nobody would notice anything different about today.

Fred looked down, 'I know - but, after we kissed - everything's different now.' She looked at him, suddenly, 'everything is different, right?'

'Oh yeah.'

'So - so you don't think they can tell?'

'From here?' He twisted in his seat and pretended to peer out of the window - looking for members of Angel Investigations snooping on them. That made Fred laugh, and she admitted she was being ridiculous. She knew it. But she didn't have a whole lot of dating experience, lately - she had spent the past 5 years in a cave, after all.

'Yeah, I know what that feels like,' Gunn said to her.

'How?'

'Because now everything's so bright, my eyes hurt.'

She smiled, he smiled back - and they stared into each other's eyes … the seconds extending as they lost themselves to just - gazing. Slowly, slowly, they began to lean across the table - moving in for another kiss. Fred closed her eyes.

Their beepers went off - and they both pulled back to check them. 'Wesley!' they said in unison.

* * *

'We've managed to identify the demon from Doyle's vision,' Wesley told the assembled team. 'It's a Senih'd - and if Doyle's information is accurate, should rise somewhere in the mid city area before nightfall.' He handed the leather bound book, with the illustration of the demon, to Gunn so that the street fighter could look at it. After a couple of seconds, Gunn passed it onto Fred. As the book passed between them, their hands brushed each other - and they shared a secret smile. Wesley noticed - and looked away.

Fred handed the book onto Cordy, 'yeuch - this is even grosser than my drawing of it, I'm glad its not me that has to see these things in my head,' the woman exclaimed - before passing it onto her boyfriend.

'You and me both, darlin',' Doyle said - not even bothering to glance at the picture of the demon before he handed it to Angel, 'I wouldn't wish these visions on my worst enemy - never mind on the woman I love.' They smiled at each other - and kissed. Angel noticed - and looked away.

'Right,' he said, 'is there a plan? I hope it involves me - the demon - and the pointy end of a sword.' He glanced back at where Cordelia had now rested her head on Doyle's shoulder. 'I got a lot of pent up … stuff … that needs working out,' he muttered.

'Yes,' Wesley gave him an odd look, 'the Senih'd manifests in its physical form for one purpose alone - to feed. The demon - immediately on rising - will go to ground to search for a victim. We will be making sure it doesn't find one. Angel - you will take the sewer tunnels. The rest of us will go by car to Sorensen Park. We'll enter the underground from the water treatment plant there, double back. Hopefully we should be able to track it and kill it before it ever sees the light of day.'

'Sounds like a plan,' Doyle said.

'Oh goody - an afternoon slicing and dicing a human eating slime monster - those are my favourite types of afternoon,' Cordelia said, as the team made their way over to the weapons cabinet. 'So what kind of weapon do we think we're gonna need?' She picked up a broadsword. 'This looks a good one,' and proffered it to Doyle.

Angel took it from her, instead. 'That's my favourite broadsword,' he said to her.

She wrinkled her brow, as she looked him. 'OK - whatever.'

Angel felt foolish.

Meanwhile Doyle helped himself to an axe. 'I prefer these to swords,' he told her - as she selected a sword of her own.

'An axe does take less skill to use than a sword,' Angel muttered, 'I can see why you'd like them.' But he said it too loud, the half demon turned - and stared at him. He wasn't looking too friendly.

'OK then,' Angel tried to smile - pretending he hadn't said anything, 'I'll just be off to the sewers then … see you all at the water plant.' He headed down into the basement. Doyle watched him go - frowning.

* * *

'Oi loike axes more t'an oi loike swords, Princess,' Angel said to himself, as he walked through the sewers, alone. He hammed up his own, native, Irish brogue in order to mimic the half demon more accurately - his voice bounced off the curved walls of the tunnels and came back to him, in a lilting Irish echo. He snorted. 'Idiot… _short_ idiot… and then he goes and sends me on a wild goose chase in the sewers to kill some slime demon that he probably just cooked up in his head.' He snorted again.

He reached the water plant, and climbed out of a manhole and into the building itself. Immediately he was hit by the acrid scent of blood - and the blood was not human. 'Maybe you are real, then. And - wherever you are - you're wounded,' he said out loud. He sniffed and followed the metallic smell of the blood, 'and you went this way…' he set off through the building, 'better than breadcrumbs.' He heard a low growling sound. 'I know you're close…' he said.

Above his head, the Senih'd crawled across the pipes watching him. He didn't notice - and his mind went back to Doyle and Cordelia. 'I mean what does she see in him?' he asked the world at large, 'is it the polyester shirts? The drinking? Or the chest hair? … tell me it's not the chest hair.'

The demon dropped down behind him and he whirled around to face it, 'I mean - given the choice - wouldn't you rather date _me_?' he asked. The Senih'd swiped at him with his claws and he leapt backwards, 'well OK - maybe not _you_ ,' Angel acquiesced. He punched the demon - and it staggered backwards, 'but women - in general.'

The demon came back at him, and hit him - sending him flying through the air. He landed heavily on the ground. His sword clattered from his hand. 'I'm brave,' he said - listing his own merits as he grabbed his weapon and got back to his feet, 'I'm a champion.' The Senih'd punched him again, 'I can take a punch.' He kicked the demon in the chest. 'I'm never gonna die, I'm always gonna be pretty, I'm father to the world's _cutest_ baby - and my taste in clothes is…' he was knocked down again, '...it's like a gay man's taste - she said so herself. I am one snappy dresser.' He got back to his feet - sword raised, 'so tell me honestly,' he said to the demon, 'what on earth does _Doyle_ have to offer her that I can't?'

He swung his blade at the Senih'd - but before he could make contact - the demon roared and then crashed through the walls of the plant. It ran out into the park, and the vampire immediately shied away from the sunlight which came streaming in. He watched, helplessly, as the demon ran across the grass and grabbed a woman.

...

The woman began to scream and struggle, trying to free herself. But the Senih'd was too strong. Angel could do nothing to help her - she was too far away. If he ventured out of the protective gloom of the building, he would be dead long before he reached her.

...

But then Gunn appeared on the crest of the hill. 'It's here!' he yelled, and ran down towards the demon and the woman. The rest of the gang appeared a moment later - running behind him, weapons raised.

The Senih'd used the woman as a shield to block itself from attack. Gunn stood on the balls of his feet - axe raised - ready to strike, but he couldn't get in. As the rest of the team gathered around - the demon saw that it was surrounded. With a roar of frustration, it threw the woman away from itself - hoping to make his escape. She ploughed straight into Doyle, who caught her about the waist, but the momentum was too great and they both fell down … Doyle landing first and protecting her from the fall. Cordelia was immediately at their side, helping them both up.

Wesley and Gunn launched themselves at the demon. Fred edged around the small fight, nervously, keeping her own sword held out in front of her the whole time. The Senih'd could not escape from so large a group - and it continued to roar out it's anger. It struck out with its fists, sending first Gunn - and then Wesley, flying. Fred flinched and squealed as it turned on her - but she kept on facing it. It roared again and knocked the blade from her hand, before throwing her away from itself. She landed on the floor by the two men, and the Senih'd roared again at them.

But - unnoticed - Doyle had crept up behind it. He swung his axe with all his might and cleaved its head from its shoulders. The decapitated head rolled along the floor and came to rest at Cordelia and the hostage woman's feet. They both stared down at it in disgust.

And then the body of the Senih'd seemed to collapse in on itself, melting into a black, oil like substance, before vanishing completely.

'Well that's dead,' Cordy said, her eyebrow raised, she turned to the woman, 'are you OK - did he hurt you?'

'I'm fine,' the woman turned and then threw her arms around Doyle - who stood still and looked stunned. 'You saved me - you killed it - thank you, thank you!'

'Ah - it's all in a day's work,' he said, modestly, as she let go of him. But he looked very pleased with himself.

Cordelia was looking very pleased with him too. She also threw her arms around her boyfriend, and gave him a kiss, 'you were a total hero.'

'Way to go, Irish,' Gunn was back on his feet - he had helped Fred up - and they were now joining in the congratulations. Slower, Wesley stood back up by himself. He looked at the small group of victorious demon fighters; Cordy and Doyle, Fred and Gunn - all looking flushed and happy.

...

He turned away - and saw Angel, across the park; still lurking in the dark of the water plant. The vampire was also staring at the happy couples. And - just like Wesley - he was all alone.


	50. Couplet: Part Two

'You think you know someone,' their new client said to Angel, 'you really think you've found something special - and that there could be a future there.' Angel wasn't really listening - he was gazing past the woman, out into the lobby, where he was watching Doyle and Gunn reenact the killing of the Senih'd - to much applause from Cordy and Fred.

'But there's always something,' the woman said, 'someone else - in the way - messing things up for you just by _being_ there.'

The vampire tore his gaze away from the happy foursome, and switched his attention back to his client. 'But what makes you think this other woman is a witch, Ms. Frakes?'

Ms. Frakes looked surprised at the question. 'Why else would Jerry cheat on me?' she asked. 'We've been engaged for eight years - she had to have put some kind of a spell on him.'

* * *

Wesley spoke quietly into the phone. Like Angel, he too was more interested in watching what the happy couples were up to, than he was in doing his job. Though for him - the objects of his attention were Fred and Gunn. 'I'm looking for the original Greek if it's at all possible,' he said to the bookstore owner, on the other end of the line.

As the answer came back - he saw Fred throw back her head and begin to laugh, as Gunn acted out the Senih'd melting into black oil. He shook and vibrated his body - making it go all like jello - and then dropped to the floor. Doyle stood above him - still wielding his axe - looking every bit as pleased with himself as he had in the park. Cordelia took on the role of the rescued woman, 'my hero!' she cried throwing her arms around her boyfriend, 'you saved me!' Only Fred was left on the sofa, now, and Wesley moved his head slightly - so that the wall blocked his view of the rest of the gang. He gazed out at the vision of the now solitary Fred, sitting on the sofa - laughing in delight. He smiled.

The he heard the bookstore owner confirm that the original Greek was in store. 'It is? Excellent. Can I get a quote on that?'

* * *

Angel leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. 'Well - if you give me the woman's name - I'll have someone check her out. See if we can find out if she's a - witch.'

Ms. Frakes pulled some papers out of her purse and handed them across. They were printouts of emails. 'HotBlonde37159,' she told him, 'I got these off Jerry's computer.'

The vampire glanced down at them - all she had was a pseudonym? This was going to take the kind of detective work they sucked at - actual detecting. Really they were much better at the slice and dice part of the game. 'This is - ah.. gonna,' he glanced up as Wesley walked into the office, 'uh - it's gonna be pretty difficult to find her based solely on this.'

'Well just follow Jerry!' Ms. Frakes sounded annoyed, 'I'm sure he'll lead you straight to her.'

Angel looked at his boss, 'Ms. Frakes, here, wants us to stake out her fiance. I was trying to explain to her that…'

'Oh I'm sure we can spare someone to keep an eye on Ms. Frakes' fiance,' Wesley replied. 'Gunn!' he yelled out into the lobby, and the street fighter got up from the sofa. 'If witchcraft is involved, we should probably look into it,' the watcher finished up, just as Gunn arrived in the office.

'What's up?'

'Ah, Gunn, Ms. Frakes here needs some surveillance work doing,' Wesley told him. 'I thought if you were free...'

Gunn agreed that this was no problem - and he began to take down the details of Jerry's whereabouts from his suspicious fiancee. Fred arrived in the office, just as the street fighter was finishing up. She smiled at Wesley, 'we won't let you down,' she said - and the pair of them left the hotel together. Wesley looked annoyed - and escorted their client to the door.

Angel went back to watching Doyle and Cordelia - who were alone in the lobby now. They had begun to kiss - like they were a couple of teenagers. This was a place of business, people! And they were far too old for such a public display. He looked down at the emails in his hand, and had a sudden idea. 'Hey, net boy - get in here!' he shouted.

The Irishman disentangled himself from Cordelia - with much squelching and sucking sounds that were far too audible to a vampire's ears - and appeared in the doorway. 'You rang - oh, dark avenger?' he said.

'Quit calling me that,' Angel snapped. He thrust the emails out towards Doyle, who took them and glanced down at them. 'You're our computer whizz kid,' Angel said, 'HotBlonde37159 - see if you can track her down on the net. You don't seem to have anything better to do.'

'Oh I got lot's better to be doin',' he glanced back at Cordelia and winked, 'but I'll see what I can do.'

'Make it snappy,' Angel told him.

Doyle raised an eyebrow at his brusque tone, 'I'll do my best.' He turned to go. 'Hey Cordy - come help me do some internet stalkin',' Angel heard him say.

* * *

The two loveless members of Angel Investigations entered the rare books shop together. They were both in a bad mood. But it was Angel, in particular, who was letting his sulky side show. He was feeling, keenly, the fact that he hadn't been able to kill the Senih'd - once it ran out into the sunlight. And that it was Doyle, of all people, who had struck the fatal blow.

'Just… kinda makes me wonder if any of you actually need me,' he said, trailing his fingers along the rare books.

'Of course we need you, Angel,' Wesley said absentmindedly. He approached the counter, and spoke to the man there. 'Hello, I rang earlier enquiring about Grammaticus Third Century Greek Commentaries.'

The man nodded, 'of course, I'll just be one moment.' He disappeared into the back.

'OK - what for?' Angel said.

Wesley frowned, and turned to look at him. 'What for, what?'

'What do you need me for?'

'You're our champion, Angel - you help the hopeless.'

'Seems to me you guys all got it covered. You do the translating, Fred does the calculations, Gunn heads up the killing, Doyle's got the visions - and Cordy patches everyone up afterwards… where do I fit in?'

Wesley fixed him with a stern look - but it was still a sympathetic one. 'We all have our place, Angel, But we are a team. We work together - magnify each others strengths - compensate for each other's weaknesses.'

'Like not being able to go out in the sunlight,' Angel muttered.

'Exactly - you were the one best placed to track that demon today - your speed, your senses… we can't do that. But when the creature fled into the sunlight - we were there to finish the job.'

'Yeah well - Doyle's vision told you where to go anyway - what did I actually offer?'

'You forget one vital thing,' Wesley told him, 'Doyle's vision came for _you_. They are messages sent to you, by the higher powers - because you are their champion. Doyle is only their messenger - and the rest of us are … hangers on. We all play our part, of course, but if it weren't for you, Angel, Doyle would never have received that vision. The Senih'd would have risen and that woman, today, would have been killed.' He looked at the vampire, his brow wrinkled with concern. 'Angel - I don't understand where all this is coming from. Have you been feeling this way long?'

'What way?' Angel looked alarmed.

'Without purpose - disconnected? You've felt this way before … it isn't a good place to be, you need to take action, if you find yourself - slipping.'

'Action? So you think I should … Hey, Wes - if you were a woman would you prefer to date short guys or taller guys?'

The watcher looked nonplussed. 'I... couldn't possibly begin to say.' He frowned, folded his arms and tried to apply his intellectual rigour to the question. 'How tall would _I_ be in this scenario?'

'Umm… about 5'6'' - give or take…'

'So around Cordelia's height?'

'For example,' Angel said, hurriedly, 'or, you know - lots of women...'

'Well…' Wesley weighed up the facts, and tried to place himself in a 5'6'' woman's shoes, 'I suppose there would be lots of things to consider. My own personal preferences, of course, but a lot would depend on the man himself - take Cordy for example.'

'What about her?' The vampire asked, quickly.

'Well - she seems perfectly happy dating a man who is practically the same height as her. If Cordy wears heels then she is taller than Doyle. It doesn't seem to bother either of them. But that isn't to say that Cordelia actually prefers short men, in general.'

'It isn't?'

'No,' he pulled himself up to his own full height, and puffed his chest out. 'Once upon a time, Cordelia had quite the thing for me, if you recall. I'm a good 6 inches taller than Doyle. And before me, there was Xander.'

'Right - yeah - _Xander_ \- let's not forget that clown,' Angel muttered. Then he looked hopeful, 'so you're saying Cordelia _does_ prefer taller men?'

'I'm saying height doesn't seem to be particularly important to her,' Wesley replied. Angel's face fell. 'But then Cordy is just one example. Women in general will all want different things. Why are you asking this?'

'No reason.'

But Wesley's brain was still ticking over, 'ah - I think I understand. It's all connected. You're feelings of uselessness in the team - you're _strange_ fascination with what women look for in a mate.'

'It is?'

Wesley nodded. 'As office romances form, you find yourself on the edge. On the outside of the team looking in. You feel lonely. The more… wrapped up in each other, the others become, the more you wonder if they would even notice if you were no longer there. You want a similar connection for yourself. You want to feel wanted. I understand, Angel - I do, but office romances … they can be tricky business. Should they fall out - become unable to work together... The less of them we have the better.'

'You really believe that?'

Wesley paused for a moment - and then, 'yes. We could all do without the complications they bring.' He looked at the vampire, his expression kindly. 'I know it can be hard - to watch others have what you cannot have - but that doesn't mean that you are not a vital part of the team. You are the reason for our mission - the reason we all came together in the first place. The founder of our family. You're just like one of the books Angel - rare - and one of a kind.'

Angel began to smile, ever so slightly - just as the bookstore keeper walked back into the room. He slammed three volumes down on the desk. 'I got three copies,' he said. The smile slid off Angel's face.

* * *

Cordelia made two cups of coffee and then returned to the desks, putting one down for Doyle, just by his computer. 'Thanks, Princess,' he said - without looking up from the screen.

'How's it going?' she asked him.

'Nothin' so far,' he told her, 'what you up to, over there?'

She shrugged, 'oh - I was just updating the Demons Demons Demons Database to put the Senih'd in. Can you believe they didn't already have him listed?'

'Sometimes technology isn't all it's cracked up to be,' the half demon frowned at his own computer, tapping away at the keyboard - as he searched for further signs of Miss HotBlonde37159.'

'Yeah - but don't ever tell Wesley that,' Cordelia said. Doyle smirked and continued his searching.

Cordelia disappeared into Wes's office and came back with the ancient volume the watcher had used to identify the demon. She located the correct page, switched on the scanner - and began to scan the picture of the Senih'd into the database. 'Well, next time one of these things materialises, the next champion to face it should have an easier job tracking it down, now,' she said - as she waited for the picture to upload.

'Yeah,' Doyle agreed, 'I just hope Fred and Gunn are havin' an easier time trackin down this mystery woman than I am. Otherwise I think we're gonna have to chalk this one up as another grand Angel Investigations failure.'

'I don't think it'll really make the list of our screw ups,' Cordy was optimistic. 'She probably isn't a witch, _he's_ probably just a cheating sleaze bag. No one's gonna die - you'll see.'

'I hope you're right.'

'I always am.'

* * *

Gunn and Fred trailed Jerry's car in Gunn's truck. Jerry stopped in Plummer Park, just across the road from a large tree - with great, sprawling, gnarly roots. He got out of his car, smoothed his hair back - and then went to stand beneath the tree - clutching a single red rose.

A moment later, the truck pulled up. Gunn switched the engine off - and the two of them stared out at the lone figure standing in the shades of the tree. 'Looks like this is it,' Gunn said, 'get the camera ready.'

Fred took the camcorder out, switched it on and set it up on the dashboard - pointing at the man. 'Do you really think he's possessed or under some kind of spell?' she asked. He looked so normal out there - kind of pathetic - clutching his rose.

Gunn considered her question. 'Well it's hard to say. There's all different kinds of magic. You've got demony love spells, mojo sex chants - voodoo bootie rituals.'

'Voodoo bootie rituals?'

He gave her a serious nod. Then they both cracked up laughing. She leaned in towards him. 'You made that up,' she accused him, smiling.

He smiled back - and looked deeply into her eyes. 'And then there is the all-powerful, big, brown, soulful eyes kinda magic.'

'I'm kind familiar with that one myself.' They were only inches apart now - grinning, and locked in eye contact. Fred closed the distance, and pressed her lips against his… before breaking away a moment later - and sitting back in her seat. 'Oh - um - we should…' she gestured towards Jerry.

'Right. Because we're all about the work.'

Fred stared back out of the windshield for a while - looking at Jerry and his rose. Whoever she was, Miss HotBlonde37159 was yet to put in an appearance. She considered things - her and Gunn, Cordy and Doyle - this guy and his fiance and his virtual lover from the lonely hearts websites …'Maybe it's not so much magical, but chemical - when two people are attracted,' she suggested. She turned back to look at Gunn. 'Maybe it's like - the DNA knows what it needs and when it finds it, nothing can get in its way. It just takes it.'

Gunn looked like he liked the sound of what he was hearing. 'It does?' he asked, raising his eyebrows suggestively. She nodded at him - and they began to kiss again.

'Charles?'

'Yeah?'

'We're not supposed to be the ones having a rendezvous,' she reminded him - pulling away for the second time.

'We're not?'

She shook her head - 'he is,' she gestured out to Jerry, still stood alone, under the tree. Gunn glanced at him, and then looked back at Fred. 'But he's cheating on someone,' he pointed out. 'You and me, we got a right.'

He leaned in for another kiss - but Fred was adamant, though she was still smiling. 'We're supposed to be working.'

He sighed, and sat back in his seat, 'you're right.' He looked out of the windshield. Jerry was no longer in sight. 'Damn!'

* * *

'I'll get started translating this material straight away,' Wesley said - as he and Angel arrived back at the Hyperion. Night had fallen, and the pair of them entered the hotel through the courtyard garden.

'You know, Wesley, thanks for what you said - back in the bookshop,' Angel said to him, 'it really made me feel better.'

'Glad I could help you put things in perspective,' the watcher replied, opening the door. 'The fact is, we are a team - and we are all as equally important to each other - there's really no need to feel that you're becoming a third wheel…' he trailed off as the pair of them entered the lobby - and saw Doyle and Cordelia making out over by the computers '... even if certain employees are busy _doing it_ on the job,' Wes finished up. He cleared his throat - and the young couple broke apart.

'Sorry, man,' Doyle said. 'We were just … takin' a breather.'

'Unless you can breathe through your ears - I'm not sure that's the appropriate word,' Wesley said drily.

Cordelia grinned in an embarrassed sort of way, 'we'll be good,' she promised. Wesley crossed over to his office, and shut the door - getting his new book out ready to start translating.

There was an awkward moment between the three people left in the lobby. 'Hey Angel,' Cordy said, 'did you get the book?'

'Hey - uh, yeah.' They all looked at each other awkwardly again. 'Well - I'm just gonna go check on Connor,' the vampire said - and hurried out of the lobby and up the stairs to his own room. Cordelia and Doyle picked up where they had left off - they were sure Fred and Gunn could do a better job of tracking this lady down than they could, anyway…

* * *

Connor was upstairs, sleeping, and Lorne was watching over him. He glanced up as Angel appeared in the doorway, 'woo - look at your aura!' the anagogic demon announced, 'things not going too well in the game of love?'

'No - how's Connor?'

'The little guy's fine - he's asleep. Let's talk about you, bub.'

'I don't wanna.'

The Host smiled - and went to fix himself a Sea Breeze. 'Well you have to - I can see it, Angelcakes. All this pent up jealousy… it's ugly.'

'I'm not…'

'Sure you are,' Lorne smiled and sat back down. 'This isn't just Cordelia colouring your energy. There are undertones.'

'Undertones?'

'Dark undertones,' the green demon nodded, wisely. He crossed his long legs - and fixed a stern gaze on the vampire. 'So how long have you and Doyle been fighting, now?'

'Uh…' Angel wrinkled his head up, as he tried to remember. He had this low lying feeling of just being … pissed off ... with his friend for so long now, that he couldn't quite recall when it had started. He remembered realising that he was in love with Cordy - back at the monastery in Tibet - though he knew his feelings went back further than that … he just hadn't recognised them for what they were, at first.

And immediately upon realising that he loved Cordy, his initial feelings had been ones of horror - though matters had been complicated on account of he had also been grieving for Buffy at the time. Cordelia was his friend, his sister … and she was Doyle's girlfriend. He had been so sure, at the time, that he must never mention his feelings to anyone - must never let on - that he couldn't try to get between Doyle and Cordy. But, after his return, he and Cordy had grown closer and closer - and Doyle had grown more and more distant, becoming angry much more easily … until the pair of them were constantly irritated with each other - and Angel no longer cared how much it would hurt Doyle, if he stole his girl.

But what had come first? Angel's increasing attraction and closeness to Cordy? Or Doyle's increasing anger? Who was in the wrong here? He didn't actually know - he wasn't sure it even mattered. 'You know…' he looked at Connor, sleeping peacefully in his crib, 'things have been tense between Doyle and me… ever since Darla showed back up.'

Lorne nodded. 'I think that was our spark. Our assassination of ArchDuke Franz Ferdinand. Our Pearl Harbour. Our Yoko Ono. But the long term causes go way back.'

'They do?'

'They do. So…' he took a sip of his drink, 'you've decided you don't care if you destroy things with Doyle - just as long as you get Cordelia? That's a big step…'

'I don't… I haven't …'

'Oh, I think you have, buddy. You need to move on - because that ship has sailed. Admit it to yourself and make peace with it. You're a love rival now - and that can't end happily. But the real question is … what if you end up destroying things with Cordelia?'


	51. Couplet: Part Three

Wesley took a sip of his tea and began to hum, as he concentrated on translating the Greek commentary on the Nyazian scrolls. It felt good to be transcribing, it felt good to be getting stuck into prophecy and destiny and the scales hanging in the balance and … not having to wonder what Fred was doing right now on a stakeout with Gunn...

Realising his mind was wandering back to matters painful, he redoubled his efforts. ' _Patriki_ … _patriki_ ,' he muttered, reading the symbols. 'From ' _Patrikos'_?' he wondered, out loud 'paternal?' He scribbled down the word - and looked at the next groupings of letters. 'Aha - yes - _patriki schesi_ … Paternal relationship… Angel and Connor! Now we're getting somewhere.'

* * *

Angel looked awkward. 'Destroy things with Cordelia?' he asked, 'you really think I could?'

Lorne gave him a pitying look, 'Oh munchkin, munchkin,' he said - shaking his head. 'Love is a dangerous game, and a messy business. Look at your last relationship - your girl got vamped, you abandoned all your friends so you could hunt her down and kill her - you failed, you knocked her up instead, and then she killed herself in an alleyway. And the relationship before? You slept with your heart's desire - turned evil - killed her friends and kept the leather pants industry in serious business for a couple of months. Then you try and get the world sucked into hell and she kills you, and you spend 300 years in a hell dimension. By the time you come crawling back onto this plane of existence - you and her can't even be in the same city as each other, let alone the same relationship.'

Angel shifted in his seat, uncomfortable, 'I take your point.'

'And that was with women whose hearts were free at the point of inception. If you disentangle Cordelia from Doyle - and then things still head south for you guys - that's just one more thing she will hold against you.'

'So you're saying I should just leave things be?'

'I'm saying your path's unclear. You're at a crossroads - aren't you always? Whichever fork you take is going to require sacrifice and loss - maybe for you, maybe for Doyle - but certainly, someone will end up getting hurt. Maybe everyone.'

'Do I have to sing?'

Lorne began to laugh, 'sing all you want,' he told the vampire, 'it won't change the truth. You have become one third of a love triangle - and the spare part, at that. I can read you loud and clear, buddy, your aura is practically screaming - but your path is your own to decide.'

'It is? Well - what about Cordelia's? Or Doyle's? Could you … maybe … get them to sing. Find out what their paths are? And then I'd know what to do.'

But the green demon gave him a stern look, 'you know I'm no sing and tell,' he said, 'their paths are their business. But here's a question for you - and it's one I want you to really think about. Making your move on Cordy might be what is best for you - but is it what's best for Cordelia?'

The vampire looked annoyed - he opened his mouth to try and argue - and then closed it again. He looked down at his feet, 'well - I am a champion,' he said at last.

'You're the best of the best, champ, never say I didn't say that. But does Cordelia need a champion? Does she even want one?'

'Isn't that up to her to decide?' Angel asked. He shrugged his shoulders, 'seems only fair that she - she gets the full picture, knows what all her options are - guy wise.' He looked at Lorne - there was a question in his eyes.

Lorne nodded slowly, he kept a sympathetic smile on his face the whole time. 'That's one way to look at it,' he agreed.

'What's the other?'

'The other is - by introducing a choice to her - you make things complicated, introduce heartache - where right now she's happy. You put her in a position where she either has to reject you - or break Doyle's heart. And she loves you both, she doesn't want to hurt anyone. But you're willing to force this upon her. She values your friendship and you're willing to risk it all.'

'For something better!' Angel protested.

'For something _different_ ,' Lorne corrected.

'So you're telling me to get over her and move on?' The vampire concluded, sullenly.

'I told you already, I'm not telling you anything. Except this - the path is yours, bro - the choice to make your intentions known is yours alone. But are you doing this for your own sake? Or Cordelia's? And if you truly love her - whose needs should you be putting first? So - what I am telling you is - go downstairs - and look at her. Really look at her. Does she look like she's waiting for a big lunk of hero sandwich to ride in and sweep her off her feet? Or does she seem happy how she is? With what she has? If you make a move on her - are you going to make her life better? Or worse?'

'Maybe I'll just make it _different_ ,' he tried to use Lorne's own words against him.

But the Host wasn't accepting that. 'Nuhuh - go - look - see … does she want you? Does she need you? Or do you need to back off? You're a hero, hero - it means putting other people's needs first. In this case - it's Cordy's needs. So go - and decide what to do.'

Angel got to his feet, looking awkward, 'right now?' he asked.

Lorne nodded, 'no time like the present.'

'Are you OK to look after Connor while I …'

'I'm here all night.'

'Thanks.' And the vampire made his way back down to the lobby so he could better observe the other two points in his love triangle.

* * *

Fred and Gunn exited the truck and ran over to the tree. They searched around, twisting and turning to see if they could find any sign of him. But he'd just - vanished. There was no way he could have got so far in the time they'd taken their eyes off him. And absolutely no way HotBlonde37195 could have turned up - met him - and then taken him off somewhere for a secret tryst. Maybe Ms. Frakes was right - maybe the other woman really was a witch - with the power to make people disappear.

'There's nothing,' Fred said, with a deep sigh - coming to the inevitable conclusion that they really had lost him. Wesley was gonna flip. Especially as he would be sure to want to know how they had managed to lose him. And he'd just _know_. She knew he'd know.

'More like a whole load of nothin',' Gunn replied. He too was worrying about their boss' reaction. 'How are we gonna explain this?' he asked, 'Sorry Wes - we lost the dude, 'cause we were macking on the job?'

'We didn't so much lose him as…' she scanned the empty horizon, 'OK we lost him. But his car's still here. So he must be somewhere close, right?'

Gunn bent down and picked something up - he had finally found a clue. It was the single red rose that Jerry had been clutching. They looked at each other. 'There has to be an explanation,' Fred said.

'The camera!' Gunn realised.

'You're right - maybe he saw the camera.'

'No! I mean … whatever happened - we got it on tape.'

'Right!' She flipped the screen on the camcorder and pressed rewind until Jerry came into view - standing in the exact spot they stood now, clutching his rose. 'There he is.'

'Push play,' Gunn urged. She did so - and they peered at the screen, their expressions turning to one of alarm as they saw one of the giant roots unearth itself from the ground, wrap around Jerry and then drag him under. The whole thing took a matter of seconds - and was completely silent.

'Well that can't be good,' Fred said - just as the root unearthed itself once more, grabbed them both, and pulled them under the soil.

* * *

'This doesn't look good,' Doyle said, frowning at his screen.

'It's looking even worse from over here,' Cordelia replied, from over by her own computer - where she was on the missing person's database.

'What's going on?' Angel asked, appearing at the counter - he glanced between Cordy and Doyle. They weren't still making out - he noted - which was good, they had gone back to work at their respective desks. And that created distance between them. Cordelia sort of had her back turned to her boyfriend. Maybe she didn't like him that much after all...

'Hey, Angel,' she twisted to look at him, 'we've been researching Ms. Frakes' so called witch.'

'And we're not so sure she is a witch,' Doyle added, 'but she's somethin' - and Mr. Frakes … whatever he's called - could be in real danger.'

'Well - Fred and Gunn are tailing him,' Angel said, 'I'm sure if it's bad they'll call in. So, what did you find?'

'Well HotBlonde string o' numbers has been workin' the lonely hearts websites for a while now it seems. I found a few profiles, and found a few o' the poor saps she's been makin' contact with. Hacked around a bit, found some messages - some details… '

'And?'

It was Cordelia who answered, 'and - when I ran the names of some of the men she contacted - boom - up they pop on the missing person's database.'

'They were reported missing?'

'Every single name Doyle has managed to identify has turned up missing,' she confirmed.

'And there's a whole load more profiles she's been talkin' to that I haven't managed to - uh - _identify_ yet.'

'Multiple victims?' Angel mused - 'vampire?'

'No bodies turning up,' Cordy said, 'just a lot of missing people … oh hey, this might be something…'

'What?' Both men looked at her expectantly.

'This is the second report that mentioned that the men were last seen in the vicinity of Plummer Park.'

'That rings a bell…' Doyle said, he frowned and began to tap away at his keyboard - eventually finding what he was looking for. 'Yeah - here - HotBlonde5240 was messaging a gentleman going by the name o' _mightyThorshammer_ who I managed to track down as being one Dwight Wrigley… she suggested they meet at Plummer Park.'

Cordelia brought up Dwight Wrigley on the missing person's database. 'This isn't one of the reports that mentions Plummer Park,' she said, 'so that's three different name checks from two different sources. I think we have a location for our abductress, serial killer chick… I wonder if ...' she opened up a new tab on her computer, and began to search for something.

'I wonder why he called himself 'Mighty Thor's Hammer'?' Angel wondered, 'I mean, is he really into Norse mythology? Or is _he_ a demon? Some Troll Gods carry big hammers …'

'Uh Angel,' Doyle leaned on the counter towards the vampire, his left eyebrow raised, ' _I think it's what he calls his penis,'_ he hissed in a stage whisper.

'Oh. _Ew_.'

'Yep, bud, the world of online datin' is not a pretty one. It's a good job I got Cordy, and you're doomed to be alone - 'cause I really think it might be the future.'

'I don't necessarily have to be alone,' Angel said.

Doyle raised an eyebrow, 'you got a fix for that perfect happiness clause? Or are y' just lookin' to date a nun?'

'I like nuns … anyway I don't always lose my soul ...Darla…'

'Yeah yeah - couldn't make y' happy.' He raised his eyebrow again, and his eyes became hard and challenging, 'so what you're offerin' a girl is a lifetime of _knowin'_ that she always comes second to Buffy. Until the day she doesn't … and you kill her and everyone she cares about. Good plan.'

Angel opened his mouth to make a snappy retort - but then shut it again. There wasn't really a come back to that. Doyle smirked and turned back to his computer. Angel fought the urge to punch him.

'Hey - guys - stop your bickering and listen up,' Cordy called across to them. They came over to stand beside her and look at her screen - she was on the Demons Demons Demons database. 'So you know this website is really in depth - and lists lots of demon species indigenous to L.A county?... even if it was missing the Senih'd, earlier?'

Both men nodded. 'Well - on a hunch I typed Plummer Park into the search bar, to see if it was a lair or a demon hideout or anything and…' she clicked and a picture of a tree came up. ' _Arbor mala viventem_ ,' she read, 'it's a type of demon tree - lures victims towards it and then sucks them under the ground - and feeds itself from their essence.'

'It sucks 'em dry?' Doyle asked.

'By sticking a branch through their chests.'

'OK - but aren't we're getting a bit ahead of ourselves, here?' Angel asked, 'I mean, if the tree is the one doing the kidnapping, where does HotBlonde fit in. What? Is she the tree's pimp?'

'She might be a front,' Cordelia said.

'But what about the witch theory, huh? Ms. Frakes said there was no other reason than a magic spell that he would go out with some other woman.'

'What Ms. Frakes is overlooking, there, is that her fiance is a _man,'_ Cordelia replied tartly, 'and therefore synonymous with "cheating scumbag",'

' _Princess!'_ Doyle sounded reproachful. Angel glanced between them … trouble in paradise?

'I just think we may be barking up the wrong tree, here.' He trailed off - as the others raised their eyebrows at his inadvertent pun. He shook his head. 'I mean, we have a serial philanderer on the internet and a killer tree in a park … are we really convinced their part of the same outfit?'

The half demon and his girlfriend exchanged a glance. 'I'm callin' Gunn,' Doyle said. 'I think this is it.'

'It's a big coincidence if not,' Cordelia nodded.

Doyle began to make the call, as Cordelia scribbled down the pertinent facts of the demon - and handed them to her boyfriend so he could read them out down the phone. Their skin brushed together, as she passed the note to him, and they both paused and smiled at one another. Angel watched them closely, whilst trying to pretend he wasn't. They were as tender towards each other as they had ever been. And they really did work well together - building on each other's research until they found the right answers. And - as he'd observed earlier in the day - they were always laughing. Doyle never made Cordy cry.

Buffy had always been crying. Darla had wept a fair few tears over Angel too - especially once she had Connor's soul inside of her. Angel always made his girlfriends cry. It was probably a part of the whole tortured champion, rocky path to redemption thing - plus the evil. There was always so much melodrama around Angel. There was never any melodrama around Cordy and Doyle. But then … did Cordelia want the melodrama? For himself - Angel almost craved it.

Were Cordelia and Doyle one of the all time great romantic couples? Or were they boring and staid? Old before their time? How was he supposed to know if he was meant to leave Cordelia to sink happily into comfortable old age with Doyle, or rescue her from a life of interminable dullness and sweep her off to a Romeo and Juliet style timeless romance with himself? This was difficult.

'You're staring, it's creepy.'

Cordelia's voice broke through his reverie, and woke him up - just as Doyle managed to get hold of Gunn. 'Hey, man - where are you? Your connection's awful. Listen - we think we got a lead for y'... uhuh… uhuh... y' already did, huh?' he held the receiver against his chest, 'they already followed their mark to Plummer Park - he vanished - they went to investigate and…'

'Let me guess? The evil tree took them?' Angel said.

Doyle nodded.

...

Fred and Gunn were trapped underground, still wrapped up in the massive root which had pulled them under. Jerry was lying on the floor a few feet away - he was very still - a branch was sticking out of his chest. 'Yeah - we found the guy and his date,' Gunn was saying into his phone.

'Wait - HotBlonde actually showed up? She's with the tree?' Doyle said, down the line.

'She _is_ the tree, man!' Gunn groaned.

'It's alive,' Fred called, 'It has a gnarly face and what looks like a DSL connection.' She glanced around, there were indeed computer screens and keyboards wrapped up in the roots. 'We think it chats up lonely hearts online and then sucks them down here for food - or maybe that's how it gets its power.'

'And it's got this big old leathery joint jammed into poor Jerry. It's sucking him dry,' Gunn said. 'You need to get down here.'

'Yeah - right - we'll just grab Wes and then we'll be on our way,' Doyle answered.

Fred and Gunn exchanged a look, 'we were hopin' maybe we could do this without botherin' Wes. You and the big man should be able to cover it.'

...

Doyle frowned into the receiver - but he guessed they didn't really have time to argue the point. 'OK - we'll be right down there.' He slammed the phone down and then looked at his two associates. 'Weapons, car, now.' He said.

* * *

The three of them drove out to Plummer Park, in the Angelmobile. They pulled up when they found both Jerry's abandoned car and Gunn's empty truck. 'This must be it,' Cordy said, nodding across the road, 'that must be the evil HotBlonde tree. What do we do?'

'We need to get down there,' Angel told her.

'Yeah - right - how - stand underneath and hope Miss lonelyhearts snatches us up too?'

'No we need to find an alternative way underground,' he pointed to a manhole cover.

Cordelia rolled her eyes. 'It's always the sewers with you, Angel.'

...

They climbed down into the tunnels - and began to make their way in the direction of the demon tree. 'We're getting close,' Angel said, 'I can smell it… you guys stay behind me.'

'Y' sure that's a good idea, bud?' Doyle asked. He had his axe gripped tightly in his hands.

'Why wouldn't it be?'

'It kills people by sticking a tree branch through their chests - you're kinda vulnerable to that sorta thing, if I recall.'

'He's right,' Cordy hissed, 'you can't face this thing - it'll turn you into a packet of instant soup mix! Me and Doyle can head inside - you stay back - and once it's distracted, try and get Fred and Gunn out.'

'I don't think…' but the young couple didn't listen to him, they pushed ahead - and then made their way into the underground cave.

The tree roared when it saw them. It sent a root whipping out to capture them - and Doyle turned and pushed Cordy backwards so that she fell to the ground, unharmed. But he was too late to save himself - and the tree grabbed him - and plunged a root deep inside his chest. He yelled out in pain - and went demon face from the shock. As he morphed into his stronger form, the tree roared out in pleasure - and removed the branch from Jerry's chest. Jerry remained very still on the floor.

'Doyle!' Cordy sat up - and saw her boyfriend impaled on a tree branch. She ran over to him and tried to pull the root out, but it was stuck fast - and the tree roared again - and used another appendage to slap her away. She was thrown across the cave, and hit the wall beside the trapped Fred and Gunn. She fell to the floor, unconscious. Fred and Gunn looked at each other in dismay. 'What do we do now?' Fred asked.

...

Angel stepped inside the cave. He took in his surroundings: the two people wrapped up in the tree roots, unable to move; Cordelia slumped unconscious, at their feet and Doyle - in the middle of the cave - having the life sucked out of him by the demon tree. He winced, as he saw the way the branch plunged straight into the half demon's chest - 'ouch that's gotta smart,' he said.


	52. Couplet: Part Four

The tree demon roared, as it sucked the life energy from Doyle. Doyle screamed out in pain. Angel looked on - his senses heightened and tingling, as he watched the half demon start to die. He could sense the life being drained from his friend - sense his heart beat slowing - smell his fear… but what he couldn't smell was any wood. Doyle's own demon scent was mingling with a second, fleshy sort of smell.

'This thing -' he said to Fred and Gunn, 'it's not made of wood?'

Wrapped up in the roots as she was, Fred struggled to shake her head. 'No,' she called back, 'it's flesh.'

'That's good,' Angel replied, 'Flesh I can kill.'

But Fred wasn't sure how he would do that. The tree didn't seem to have any vital organs that could be damaged. It used people as batteries - drew power from its victims. 'And I hate to say anything,' Gunn said, 'but I think its been gettin' stronger since it started feeding off Doyle.'

' _Doyle?'_ Angel sounded disbelieving, ' _Doyle_ is making this thing stronger?'

'He's in his demon form!' Fred gave a strangled cry, as she felt the root squeeze her ever tighter, 'he's stronger than humans, like this - he's a better power source than the tree is used to.'

'Oh _come on!_ ' Angel scoffed, stepping towards the place where the half demon was trapped, kneeling on the floor, the branch sticking out of his chest. 'He can't be that good! Taking from Doyle? I'm surprised the tree isn't getting drunk off of him. I mean - _hello_ \- the whisky fumes coming off of him are enough to make you go light headed on a good day. Sucking out his essence? That must be like hooking a still up direct to your veins.'

Even trapped in the ever tightening roots, as they were - Fred and Gunn exchanged a worried look. Doyle let out another scream - but he seemed to be getting weaker. Angel looked at him disdainfully, and then spoke to the tree, 'I mean really - you think _this_ guy is better than other men?'

'He has power!' the tree rumbled.

'Power - _him?'_ Angel sounded more disbelieving by the second. ' _What?_ \- the visions? The crossword puzzles? … Or maybe you mean this,' he seized Doyle's right arm and yanked it right back - pulling his shoulder joint right out of the socket. Doyle screamed again, as he felt it dislocate. 'That gross breaky thing his bits can do? _That's_ power? He's nothing. He's the sidekick. He's Robin to my Batman. _I'm_ the champion. I'm the worthy one, I'm the strong one. I'm the better one. That's all there is too it. I'm _better_ than he is.'

Fred and Gunn gave each other another look. This really didn't seem like the best time for Angel to be having a melt down.

The vampire didn't look at them, however, instead he glanced back at Cordelia - checking she was still unconscious - and then turned back to the tree. 'And you know,' he said, 'I'm getting a little bit tired of the way people around here don't even seem to recognise that. Doyle's a drunk. He's a thief. He let half his family get murdered by an army of pure blood demons and he can't even take a punch.' He demonstrated this fact by punching the half demon in the face.

'And we don't even wanna ask about all the things that make him go involuntarily demon face - 'cause - phew - I'm tellin' you … it's pretty gross. And yet - and yet - this absolute _waster_ \- who never even grew over five feet tall - he gets the girl?' He punched Doyle again, the half demon was now slumped over - only kept upright by the branch sticking out of his chest. Angel cast another glance over his shoulder, Cordy was still knocked out.

'He doesn't deserve her,' he told the tree, 'in a million years he shouldn't even be able to get close to a girl like Cordy. She's too smart for him, too capable. Too _tall._ She paid off all his debts and kept him safe from other lowlife demon scum like him. She's talented, she's kind - and man is she a hottie! Way out of this munchkin's league. And he gets her! And I'm just a little bit tired of everyone being OK with that - everyone being OK with Doyle - and overlooking what a _chronic_ loser he is. Because you know who does deserve her?' He thumped Doyle one last time for good measure. ' _Me._ That's who. I'm smarter than he is, faster, _taller_. I'm stronger - you think he's powerful - you know nothing - you should try me. He is _nothing_ compared to me.'

At that, the demon roared and ripped the branch out of Doyle - plunging it through the chest of Angel, instead. The vampire had been right - it did smart. He grimaced, and sank to his knees.

Over on the floor, Cordelia began to stir. She sat up - shook her head - and saw Angel with the branch sticking from his chest. 'Angel!' Then she saw Doyle lying on the floor - unconscious - beaten, and with a sucking chest wound. 'Oh my God, Doyle!' she scrabbled over to his side, and began to do what she could to stop the bleeding.

Angel looked over at her - noticing the way she had forgotten all about him, once she noticed that her boyfriend was hurt. He wrapped his right arm around the branch and pushed it in deeper. 'I guess it's a good job I'm not using my heart, anyway,' he said, ''cause that would break it.'

'Kill you,' rumbled the tree - searching inside the vampire for his life force.

'Sorry - already dead.'

'Vampire!' It realised.

'Yeah - did I not mention that?'

The cold inside of Angel; the great sucking void, where his energy and vitality should be, was draining all the power from the demon tree. The hollow husk - the empty shell that was Angel's dead body - could not act as a battery for the demon tree. Devoid of an energy source - and being fed death instead, it began to wither and shrink back. 'Cold,' it moaned, feeling itself become weaker, 'so cold.'

'Yeah - it is cold in here … but don't let that stop you.'

The tree felt its strength sap away - felt its own life force begin to ebb. The roots that had been trapping Fred and Gunn went loose, and shrivelled back - and the pair of them dropped to the floor - freed. Gunn jumped to his feet and grabbed Angel's dropped sword.

'So cold,' moaned the tree.

'So dead,' Gunn replied - and stabbed the tree right in its gnarly face. A viscous yellow liquid poured out - and the branch was retracted from Angel's chest - as the tree screamed out and then died.

Fred went to check on Jerry - who still lay unconscious on the floor. Gunn went over to Angel. The vampire nodded towards the passed out half demon, 'how's he doing?' he asked.

'He's still alive,' Cordelia replied - keeping her hands pressed tight to the wound. 'Why did the tree let him go before it killed him?'

'Angel saved him,' Fred said. But she and Gunn exchanged another dark look. They had heard things - in that underground cavern - secrets that might not be so easily forgotten - or forgiven.

* * *

Wesley sat at his desk and spoke into the phone - Fred and Gunn sat in the chairs opposite him, still caked in mud and soil. 'Yes, Ms. Frakes, we are too - you're welcome. Goodbye.' He hung up the phone. 'Well, Ms. Frakes is very happy - you've saved her fiance's life.' Jerry was in the hospital - but the doctors seemed to think he was going to be OK. There was a long moment of silence in the office - and then Wesley suggested that the pair of them go get cleaned up.

'That's probably a good idea,' Fred said, standing up.

But before Gunn could join her, the watcher asked him to stay behind for a word. The couple looked at each other, for a moment - and then Fred said good night - and left. Gunn smiled, as he watched her leave, and then turned back to face his boss. 'What's up?'

'When you knew this was more than just a tryst, you should have told me.'

'It happened so fast,' Gunn protested, 'the thing just grabbed the guy and then he was gone.'

'That's not what I meant.'

'Oh - you mean...' he pointed a thumb over his shoulder to indicate the direction Fred had left in. The he drew himself up to his full height and looked the watcher dead in the eye. 'Well - I'm not sure that's any of your business.'

Wesley stared at him for a moment, and then leaned back in his chair. 'No. You're probably right. Still she could get hurt. I trust that won't happen.'

'What are you, her brother?' He kept his tone lighthearted - but he was pissed off. Fred was a grown ass woman - a woman who had survived five years hidden in a demon dimension, at that. And a total, bona fide genius to boot. She wasn't some wilting flower in need of protection. She was old enough and wise enough to make her own decisions - and calculate her own risks - without having Wesley white knighting for her. When two people got involved - they risked heartbreak - always. But Fred could decide for herself if it was a risk worth taking. This wasn't Wesley's call.

But the watcher was feeling sorry for himself. 'Apparently,' he said in reply to Gunn's question, a self pitying smile on his face.

'Wesley, I…' he was going to tell him, not that he deserved to be told, that he, Gunn cared for Fred every bit as much as Wesley did. That there was something real between them - something special - and that his heart was on the line every bit as much as Fred's was. It wasn't exactly like Gunn was a big time player - when had he had time, or even opportunity, in the past two years to get close to a woman? Wesley was the one that went out and picked up women in bars … or whilst he was on cases. Fred was the first in a long time, for him - and she meant every bit as much to him as he did to her. And he was planning on telling Wes all that - but he was interrupted.

'She chose.' Wesley said. 'It's just important to me that she's taken care of.'

Again - grown ass woman. Bona fide genius. Took care of herself just fine in a world that hunted her kind down and treated them like cattle. Survived five years in hell and came back and managed to rebuild her life - rebuild her sanity. Gunn got all of that - he respected that - it was part of what he admired about her. But Wesley apparently didn't see it. He saw himself as the noble protector of a fragile damsel… who had inexplicably chosen to be with another man - and so now he expected this other man to be the noble protector, or else not be worthy of her. And the street fighter was too weary to get into it. 'She will be,' he said, shortly.

'Good,' Wesley picked up his pen and bent his head back towards his work - returning to his translation. Gunn watched him for a moment and then turned to leave. He hesitated in the doorway - thinking he might say something, but in the end he just walked out.

* * *

Doyle was lying on the daybed, in the corner of the lobby - Cordelia had unbuttoned his shirt and then cut his tank top open, down the middle, with a pair of scissors - so she could tend to his wound. He, of course, had not been able to follow Jerry to the real hospital - on account of his demon heritage - and so it was up to Cordelia to patch him up, like always. Her hands were gentle, as she bandaged him - and her eyes were full of love.

'You have to stop doing this to me,' she said softly, as she cleaned the blood from him. 'My heart can't take it.'

'I'm sorry.' He held her hand for a moment - stopping her from working, just briefly, and they looked deep into each others eyes. His own green eyes reflected back all the love that was in hers. Angel watched them, from a slight distance.

She applied the bandage, and then helped her boyfriend into a half sitting position. 'Do you need a sling for your arm?' she asked him. He had been able to pop his shoulder joint right back into place, of course, but - from the careful way he was moving - it was obvious he was still sore.

'No - I think I'm OK.'

'You're sure?'

He nodded - and, after a moment, she nodded too. Then she glanced across at Angel, 'could you get him his pain killers?' she asked, 'he keeps the extra strong ones in his desk for if he has a really bad vision.' The vampire nodded - and went to go get them. He came back also bearing a glass of water - and handed both to Doyle.

'Thanks,' he said, taking them. Then he raised an eyebrow at the water, 'not whisky, huh? Isn't that my usual?'

Angel looked awkward. 'Doyle - look - the things I said in there… you know I didn't mean it.'

'Any of it?'

'I had to get the tree to stop sucking on you and start sucking on me - I knew I could kill it.'

'Because you're dead inside.'

Angel looked annoyed, 'I saved your life,' he pointed out.

'He's right,' Cordelia said - 'we were totally stupid - we rushed in there, without understanding the situation. We would have been dead if it weren't for Angel. And so would Fred and Gunn.' Angel looked pleased - but the smile slid from his face when Cordy leaned forwards and brushed her lips against Doyle's, 'I don't know what I would have done if that tree had drained you completely, I just couldn't ...' Her eyes blurred with tears, and she shook her head to dispel them.

'You know I would never let anything happen to either of you,' Angel told her - his voice was soft and intense.

She smiled at him - though it was a watery smile, 'I know - you're a champion.'

He looked back at Doyle, 'and I only said those things to get the tree to go for me … you can't think that…'

Doyle fixed him with a hard look, 'OK - some of that stuff, yeah I'm happy to pretend that you only said it because you were trying to save me - that it isn't what you really think of me.'

'Doyle …'

'But - not _everythin'_ you said was about me - was it? I get you wanted to compare the two o' us, and have you come out on top, so the tree would choose you… but some of the stuff you said… was it all for the benefit of the tree?'

Cordelia looked between them. 'What did he say?' she asked.

The vampire and the half demon stared at each other for a long moment - there was a challenge in both pairs of eyes - each daring the other to speak. To tell Cordy the whole truth. But then Doyle looked away, and sighed. 'Nothin',' he said to Cordelia, 'I guess none of it matters, anyway.'

'That's right,' she said - she leaned forward and kissed him again. 'All that matters is that you're alive - and that you're going to be OK. That's all that ever matters.'

'Yeah?' he stroked her face - and then returned the kiss.

'You know it is,' she told him. Angel began to feel like he was being edged out of the conversation. 'You're the most important thing in the world to me,' she said, 'I love you more than anything.' her words had become a fierce whisper.

'Likewise, Princess.'

Angel looked at his feet - and then looked at the two of them: Doyle laid out injured on the sofa, his shirt open and his sucking chest wound exposed to the world - apart from the bandaging. And the way Cordelia hovered just above him - both gentle and fiercely protective, at the same time. There was no room for him here - not yet. Cordelia's heart was not free for the taking. As hard as it might be to accept - to understand, if he went up against Doyle, here, he would lose. The only battle he would ever lose against the half demon. But he'd lost it before he had even realised he wanted the fight.

'You guys should head home,' he said to them. Cordelia turned to look at him. 'And Doyle - I don't think you should come in tomorrow… you need to spend time recuperating. Stay at home - let Cordy take care of you.'

'Will Wesley be OK with that?' Cordelia asked.

'I'll speak to Wesley - I'm sure he'll understand. Go on - both of you - go home - spend some time; away from this place - from all this. Just … be together.'

Cordelia packed up her first aid kit, got to her feet and went to go get her purse. Doyle stood up, slowly - and began to button his shirt. The two demons stared at each other for a long time - a lot passed between them, but nothing was said. And then Doyle sighed, 'Well, I guess I should thank you for saving my life.'

'It's what I do.'

'Yeah … you're the champion.'

Cordelia arrived back at his side, and she wrapped her arm around him to support him, as they walked out. Angel stared after them, watching them go.

* * *

Once the door had closed behind them, and their voices had faded into the distance, he sighed - and made the long, lonely journey back to his room. Lorne was still there - looking after Connor. He looked up, as Angel walked in - and saw his face. 'You made your decision?'

'For now,' Angel said. 'I don't know if it's the right one or not - for me or Cordelia - but I can't win. Not right now. She loves _him_. Maybe one day … maybe...' he trailed off, and stared down at his son - who was lying in his crib, yawning and waving his little arms around under his blanket.

'You OK?' Lorne asked.

He continued to stare at Connor, a slow smile spreading across his face. 'Yeah,' he said. He picked up his son and held him close. Lorne turned to leave.

* * *

Wesley sat at his desk - he translated the next two words… _o gios -_ 'the son'.

He started, as Angel appeared in the doorway - still carrying Connor. 'Working late?' the vampire asked.

'Yes - you startled me.'

'Oh,' he jigged Connor up and down, 'we didn't mean to.' They had just come downstairs to switch the lights off - and found the watcher still in his office.

'I thought I was alone,' Wesley explained.

'Yeah,' Angel lifted Connor so he could look at him better, and smiled, 'so did I.' He kissed his son's cheek - and cradled him close for a second, before turning and leaving the office.

Wesley watched them both leave, before he looked back at the words he had just finished translating:

_The Father Will Kill The Son._


	53. Loyalty:Part One

_Angel held Connor close and looked over at where Wesley was working on his translations. 'You already know the answer,' he told the watcher, 'you're just looking for the questions.' Then he morphed into his vampire face. 'Tick tock, Wes, you're running out of time,' and he bit down on Connor's tiny throat._

' _Don't', Wesley cried out, 'stop!'_

_..._

He jerked awake. He had fallen asleep at his desk, face down on his books. Angel stood in the doorway, his son in his arms. 'Morning Wes, have you been here all night?' Wesley stared at him. The vampire looked nervous under his scrutiny, and gave an awkward chuckle, 'Wesley?' he said, 'are you alright?'

The British man shook himself, and forced his mind to the here and now - forced his mind away from the nightmarish images in his dreams. 'Uh - yes... Yes - of course,' he stretched, 'uh - crick in my neck … from sleeping on the desk.'

'Yeah - you're working too hard - you really need to make sure you take some time for yourself.'

'There's too much to do,' Wesley replied, 'are you expecting Cordelia and Doyle back in today?' he asked - trying to keep his voice casual.

Angel glanced up from his jigging Connor, 'uh - yeah, yes - Cordelia called me late yesterday, Doyle's recovered - they should be in this morning.'

Just then, the door to the lobby opened - and the sunlight streamed in, just for a moment - as the couple themselves walked in. They had their arms linked together and were whispering to each other - laughing. 'Hey - what's up?' Cordelia said, as she saw the two men in the office.

'Wesley is working too hard - I'm trying to talk him into having a break,' Angel told her.

'You should listen to him,' Cordelia said to the watcher, she kissed Doyle and smiled, 'breaks can be fun.' Doyle grinned back at her.

'Actually - I was hoping that I could have a word with you, Doyle,' Wesley said to him, 'use your new found expertise for something.'

The Irishman looked surprised, but agreed, right away. 'Sure thing, bud - though I can't promise I'll be much use.'

'Will it take long?' Angel asked, 'only I gotta take Connor for his check up - and I was hoping you would drive me, Wes, … so I didn't burst into flames.'

'Cordelia - will you drive Angel to his appointment?' Wesley asked, 'the work Doyle and I must do is… it may be very important.'

It was Cordelia's turn to look surprised, but she agreed, 'sure thing, I'll just bring the car around.' She kissed Doyle goodbye - picked up the keys to the Plymouth and left the hotel.

Angel hurriedly packed up Connor's things, grabbed his coat - and then went to meet Cordy round the back.

* * *

'What do you think Wes wanted to speak to Doyle for?' Cordelia asked. She and Angel and Connor were sitting in the waiting room at the paediatrician's - surrounded by new mothers and their babies. There was the constant sound of infants wailing going on in the background.

'I don't know,' Angel said, 'it might be something to do with …' he glanced around and lowered his voice, 'the prophecy. Wes is looking into it - trying to find out everything he can about Connor. Maybe he needed a contact or something. I'm worried about how hard he's working.'

'Well - his work is important,' Cordy reasoned, she leaned over and smiled down at Connor - who was cradled in his father's arms, 'yeah...' she said to the baby, 'Uncle Wesley works too hard because he cares so much about us all - he wants to keep us all safe - just like daddy.'

Beside them - one of the other babies started to wail, lustily. His mother sighed, 'honestly - you'd think someone was trying to kill him,' she said to the mother sitting next to her.

'Colic is the worst,' the second mother agreed.

'I hold him, I walk with him - nothing seems to work.'

'Have you tried the vacuum?' Angel asked her - the women looked at him in surprise, as did Cordelia. It was not like the dark avenger to just strike up a random conversation with a stranger. He saw their confused looks, 'sometimes the white noise from the motor will put a colicky baby right to sleep,' he explained.

The mother nodded, looking thoughtful. 'You know - I've read about that. But my problem is my older one. I can't run the vacuum whilst he's sleeping.'

'You could try taping it,' the vampire suggested, 'the sound. Just leave it playing by the crib kind of low.'

Cordelia looked impressed. The frazzled mother actually smiled. 'I should have thought of that! Mr. Dad to the rescue,' she leaned across to speak to Cordy, 'you've got a good one there, honey - it must make things so much easier.'

Cordelia laughed, and opened her mouth to correct the woman - but just then the nurse came out into the waiting room. 'Mrs. Ferguson?' she called - and the mother excused herself and took her baby in for his checkup.

Angel turned to Cordelia, his face split by a massive grin. 'Did you hear that?' he said, proudly, 'I'm _Mr. Dad!_ Check me out, I'm Mr. Dad!'

Cordelia smiled back at him, her smile was warm and fond - and reached all the way into her eyes. 'I have said it before and I will say it again,' she said, ' _you_ are a world class dork!'

'More like a world class dad!'

She threw back her head and laughed, and reached out a finger to tickle Connor's tiny, kicking foot. 'Ha! This is the easy part, buster. Let's revisit this and see if you still deserve that accolade when he's 16… when he wants to borrow your car, and take some girl out - and they stay out all night and then he comes back in the morning to tell you he hates you, you're a total embarrassment and - oh can he have twenty bucks and the car again so he can take his girlfriend to the movies? Let's see how you handle it all then.'

'Bring it on,' Angel replied, he smiled down at his son. 'I can't wait for it - all of it - but I wanna treasure each moment, you know? I wanna see him learn how to walk - and how to ride a bike - and I wanna help him pick out his tux for the prom, and then send him off to Notre Dame for Freshman year of college - or maybe Berkeley. I don't wanna rush ahead, but boy I cannot wait to see who he grows up to be.'

'Well - if he's anything like his dad, then he'll turn out to be someone pretty special... And a dork.'

'And if he's anything like his Auntie Cordelia then he'll turn out to be a total wiseass.'

'You better believe it!'

They both stared down at Connor for a moment, lost in their own thoughts. 'You ever think about this for yourself?' Angel asked her after a while. 'I mean - this could be you and Doyle, one day - would you want that?'

Cordelia's face fell, 'actually…' she began to say, but she was interrupted by the nurse calling out Angel's name.

* * *

Despite the fact that he knew they were alone in the hotel: that Lorne had gone out to meet a client; that Angel and Cordelia were at Connor's appointment and that Fred and Gunn were still out at breakfast, Wesley still shut the office door before he began speaking to Doyle.

'You know I managed to track down the original Greek commentary on the Nyazian scroll just a few days ago?' he said. Doyle nodded, slowly. 'Well - ever since then I have been working on translating it - hoping to find some clue as to the role Connor is supposed to play - in the Tro Clon, the end of days - whether he is a force of good, or of ...well, evil - whether his influence should be benign or malign on the coming events.'

'Right - any luck?'

The watcher sat in his chair, behind his desk and took his glasses off to clean them. 'There is a certain passage I would like you to look at for me,' he told the half demon.

' _Me?'_

'Yes,' he flipped through the tract until he found the apposite page. 'I think your new found decoding skills - the puzzle solving abilities you absorbed from the Nahdrah demons could be of particular use to me - here,' he handed the book across to Doyle.

The half demon stared blankly down at the page full of Greek symbols, 'ah - it's all Greek to me, bud,' he said.

'I don't expect you to translate it,' Wesley's voice was snappish, and Doyle raised an eyebrow - surprised at his tone. The watcher immediately apologised, 'I'm sorry - I haven't been sleeping - this prophecy - this translation … well I desperately need a second opinion. And there's no one else I can turn to. No one else who might be able to help.'

Doyle nodded, immediately agreeing to help. 'Alright - what do you want me to do, exactly?'

Wesley stood back up - so he could lean over the half demon, who was perched on the edge of the desk, and point to the words of the page. 'This section here is an extract from the prophecy itself,' he told him, 'the Nyazian scrolls were written in rhyming couplets - in Dactylic hexameter - it is possible, even without understanding the words - or even the letters - to follow the structure, if you know what you're looking for.'

'Quick question -'

Wesley looked at the Irishman.

'Dactylic hexameter?' Doyle asked.

'A line of six metrical feet,' the British man explained, 'in dactylic the pattern of the feet is one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables. Words like "poetry" and "basketball" are dactylic.'

Doyle counted to three on his fingers - trying out the words Wesley had suggested in his head - then he nodded, he thought he got it. 'So there's 18 syllables to a line?' he asked.

Wesley nodded. 'And the stress comes every three syllables.'

'Uhuh,' Doyle squinted at the book - and began to run his finger along the strange symbols. It must be his new found powers - but that did all make a kind of sense, and he could see the pattern. 'So now what?'

'Knowing the pattern as you do, and being something of a pattern expert … I was hoping you could maybe … scan the text - see if any particular sections - I don't know… popped out at you. Maybe the stresses are different or the rhythm… is there any part that draws your eye more than any other.'

Doyle followed the words down the page - nodding his head along in time to the syllables - which remained noiseless blurs, as he had no idea what they should sound like. But the power from the Nahdrah, the puzzle solving race of demons, meant that he could just _see_ the logic, and the pattern, and follow it without effort. He wasn't sure how he was understanding this at all, whether it was his eyes or his brain or some other part of him entirely, but it all just flowed together seamlessly - and then: 'this one,' he tapped the book. 'Right here.'

Wesley took it from him and looked - his heart sank. 'You're sure?'

'Jumped straight out at me. And I gotta admit, man, I'm surprised - I thought you were barking way up the wrong tree, there was no way I could do this. But those two lines there - the couplet? It's different from the rest - it's more - I dunno, like the stresses are slightly off or... It's just like it smacked me right in the face, y'know? This is the part you're supposed to read. This bit wants to be read - it's important.' He saw Wesley's face, 'Why? Is that bad? What's it say?'

'It is a couplet I translated a few days ago,' the watcher told him, 'and I have been hoping to find something that would tell me I was wrong.'

'What did it say?'

'If I tell you,' Wesley cautioned, 'then you cannot tell anyone - not Angel, not even Cordelia - not until we can find out more.'

'Cross my heart,' he did the action.

'It is a passage about a paternal relationship - and remember, this whole scroll is deeply linked to Connor.' He paused - and Doyle watched him, expectantly, 'the general thrust of that couplet - the important part - it says ' _the father will kill the son'_.'

* * *

The doctor examined Connor - the baby was laid out on the table and the doctor was using his stethoscope to listen to his heart. Angel hovered over him, anxiously. 'It's like a - like a soft gurgle or a wheeze,' the vampire was saying. 'It might have been a wheeze. I heard it last night when I was feeding him. You hear it?'

But the doctor shook his head, 'nope - all I hear is a healthy little heart.'

Cordelia beamed with pleasure, on hearing that - but Angel did not seem convinced. 'You don't understand. I've got really good hearing. I mean _really_ good hearing.'

'Well, most first time parents do,' the doctor smiled. The second time around - they were always far more relaxed. 'You said this wheeze or gurgle happened when you were feeding him?'

'Is that bad? What is it?' the vampire looked anxious. But the doctor was quick to reassure him. 'In my professional opinion - it's called digestion.'

'Oh.'

Cordelia giggled, 'I told you you were a dork.' She turned to the doctor, 'so he's OK - he isn't, like, a freak baby or anything?'

'Cordelia!' Angel admonished, before looking worried, 'well is he?'

'No. Your son is just fine.' He picked the baby up off the table and handed him back to his father.

'So when should we get the blood tests back?'

'In about a week,' the doctor told him, 'but it's just a precaution, really.'

'So he's OK, Connor's healthy?'

The nervous first time parents always made the doctor smile. 'He's fine,' he assured the new father, 'Connor is about as healthy as it is possible for a human being to be.'

Angel looked delighted, 'you hear that?' he said to his son, then he went to shake the doctor's hand. 'Thank you.'

Cordelia made her way to the door - but stopped when she got there - and turned back. 'Angel, sweetie, you can let the doctor go now,' she said.

The vampire was still gripping the doctor's hand - a big, doofy smile on his face. He looked over at her - realised what he was doing, thanked the doctor one more time - and then followed Cordelia out of the office.

The doctor looked down at his hand, 'damn! And they go on about my cold hands!' Then he laid Connor's chart down next to the labelled test tube of his blood - and left the room.

...

A moment later the door opened - and one of the mothers from the waiting room slid inside, carrying her own baby. She took a vial of blood from her purse - identical to Connor's - and placed that alongside his chart, putting Connor's real sample into her bag. The door opened again and the nurse came in. 'There you are!' she said to the woman, 'did you get turned around? You're supposed to be in exam three.'

'Oh, my mistake.'

* * *

When Cordelia, Angel and the baby arrived back at the Hyperion - it was to find Fred and Gunn in the lobby looking at a whole load of packages. 'Hey Angel!' the street fighter greeted him, 'these all came for you… I don't get it. You got no last name - no bank account - how are you ordering this stuff off the web?'

'It wouldn't be that difficult,' Fred said - thinking the problem through, as Angel crossed to the weapons cabinet and selected a dagger to slit the boxes open with. 'You just have to hack into the shipping database, find someone who is buying what you want and then substitute their details for yours - me or Doyle could do it, easy.' She saw the expressions on the two men's faces, 'but we wouldn't,' she added, 'because that would be hi-tech robbery.'

Angel glanced over at where Cordy was putting her purse down - and then leaned into the other two and lowered his voice, 'I memorised all of Cordelia's credit card numbers,' he told them.

'That would be low tech robbery.'

Cordelia emerged from behind the counter, cup of coffee in hand. 'Are Wes or Doyle around?' she asked the others.

'They're still locked in Wes' office - they seem pretty deep in discussion, we didn't wanna disturb them,' Gunn told her. Then he took something wooden and curved from the first open box and frowned at it. 'What is this? Some kind of boomerang vamp stake?'

'No!' Angel laughed and took out another, 'they're itty bitty hockey sticks.' Then he pulled a tiny hockey jersey out of the box. It had 'Connor 03' emblazoned on the back. 'Check this out! How cute is this, huh? Seriously!' He went to the fridge and took out a mug of blood, taking a sip. He glanced at it for a moment … and then went back to the unpacking.

Cordelia left them to it - and went to knock on Wes' door, just as Gunn told Angel he had too much time on his hands. She heard Fred admonish him - saying he knew it was adorable, and Gunn admitting that, yes - he did, but he was far too manly to say so.

She smiled to herself and raised a hand to knock on the office door. From here she could hear less of the unpackaging - but she could get some snippets from the hushed conversation taking place inside.

'You think you might know a guy?' she heard Wesley say - and then Doyle answered in the affirmative. That made her smile - Doyle always knew a guy.

'I just think - on somethin' this big - we need to get a second opinion - and maybe a third and a fourth. We gotta learn everythin' we can.'

'Very well - make contact - see if he can help us.'

She knocked - and the conversation cut out straight away. She opened the door - and they both turned to stare at her. Their expressions were grim. 'Wow,' she said, looking between them, 'is something bad happening? Is this something we should all be worried about?'

Wesley and Doyle glanced at each other - just for a moment - but she saw... and then Doyle smiled at her in a reassuring way. 'Not yet, Princess … Wes is just struggling with a translation. We're getting a second opinion on it - no need to worry anybody 'til we know what's what.'

'Uhuh,' she looked sceptical. 'If this is about Connor - ' and from the glance the two men gave each other at her words, she knew that it was, 'then you ought to tell Angel - even if it's just a suspicion. He's Connor's father - there is nothing he doesn't need to know.'

'What? You mean like last time, when Wes announced to us all that the big man was slated to die - only to find out that - whoops he's gonna become human instead? We know prophecies aren't always clear. No need for anyone to get worked up until we know more.'

'But -'

'Doyle's right,' Wesley interrupted. 'Angel is a new father - he worries about the smallest and most normal things when it comes to Connor. It wouldn't be fair of us to add to that until we are one hundred percent sure that we're right. I'm probably wrong anyway.'

But Cordelia noticed the two men exchange an uneasy glance, once again - and she knew they didn't really believe that. They knew they were right - whatever it was they were right about. But, equally, she had just watched Angel fuss at a doctor over totally normal sounds Connor made whilst he was feeding - maybe there was something to keeping quiet until things were more certain. No one wanted Angel to go nuts and go off the deep end again over nothing… and he did have a tendency to go off the deep end.

'Fine,' she smiled - 'keep your little secrets - for now. But I want to know what's going on _the minute_ you have confirmation that you're right, understood?'

'Understood, Princess,' Doyle gave her a smile that was aiming for reassuring. Then he told Wesley he would go look his guy up - make contact with him - and he left the office, and the hotel.

* * *

Out in the lobby - Gunn and Angel had started up a hockey game with the tiny sticks - as Fred cradled Connor and looked on.

'You know - hockey has gotta be about the whitest sport there is,' Gunn said, as he tried to get the puck past the vampire.

'True - but the games are all indoor - and they're mostly at night.' He seized the puck off Gunn and whacked it with his stick. It flew through the air.

...

Wesley looked up from his desk as he heard the sound of breaking glass.

...

Angel looked down at the tiny stick in his hand, in dismay, 'you know - these aren't regulation size…'

The door opened - and a dark haired woman walked in, 'Excuse me,' she said, 'Is this Angel Investigations? I need your help.'

* * *

The woman was ushered into Wes' office - and the gang listened, as she told them her story. The previous Monday, her son, Timmy, had snuck out of the house. She had gone out looking for him - he loved the pier and so she checked there - but she found nothing. She had gone home and waited up all night for him to return. He had come back just before dawn but … there had been something wrong with his face. He had been angry - he had yelled horrible names at her - and pounded on the door, screaming at her to let him in. It had scared her. She had been frightened of her own son. But then, the sun had come up and Timmy - just went up in flames.

Everyone was quiet for a moment - once she had finished telling her tale. And then Wesley spoke up to assure he she had done the right thing. 'If you let him in - he would have killed you.'

'At least he would still be alive,' she said - the tears standing out in her eyes.

'No.' Gunn shook his head. 'What came to you door - that wasn't your son,' just like it hadn't been Alonna, 'it looked like your son, but it wasn't him.' … And if you repeated that enough times then you could almost make yourself believe it… almost.

But the woman wasn't ready to believe that - not yet. She still thought that - if she could have just let him in - just reasoned with him - then maybe they would have been able to find a way to turn him back. If she hadn't let him go up in flames - then somehow - maybe - she could have got her boy back. But she hadn't realised about the danger of the sun - hadn't realised what he was - until it was too late.

But Angel explained to her that there was no going back - no cure. 'No matter how much you want to believe that there is some part of him left that you can save - all that is left is an evil thing.' Wesley gave him a sharp look - and then looked down at his hands, frowning. Cordelia noticed - and also began to frown.

'You say your son went to the pier that night?' Wesley asked the woman, she nodded - and Wes asked Gunn to go there and do some reconnaissance whilst it was still light out. No fighting, though - he stipulated - if it was a nest they would take care of it as a group. Gunn agreed - saying he would take Fred with him.

The woman looked down, she watched Angel lay Connor in his bassinet. 'If I could have killed that thing myself - I would,' she said to them, 'it made me afraid of my little boy, I just don't understand any of this - I don't know what to do…'

* * *

'Wesley Wyndam Pryce heads up the operation,' the dark haired woman told the small group assembled around her. 'Doles out assignments, specialises in reference and research.' She showed the photograph she had taken with a hidden camera, whilst inside the Hyperion, and then moved onto a photo of Fred.

'This woman - nicknamed Fred - appears to be the resident science expert, it's unclear if she is a fighter. Then _this_ woman …' she indicated a picture of Cordy, 'Cordelia Chase, takes care of the more everyday aspects of the office. She is the business manager - and the first aider. From what I could pick up, she is special to Angelus - somehow - he is training her as a fighter, though she still has a way to go before she can take to the field alone. I was unable to photograph the second man - he was out of the office at the time of my visit. I'm unsure as to what role he plays in the team. And then finally there is Charles Gunn. He's big, very strong - could be a formidable opponent. Though he seems to be a bit impulsive. We may be able to use that in the future.'

Holtz stood up, and smiled at his spy. 'Good work, Aubrey.'

She smiled back, 'thanks, boss.'


	54. Loyalty: Part Two

Doyle sat in the demon dive bar, he bought the spiny headed Miquot demon another beer, 'so you think you can get me the number?' he asked.

'This is dangerous stuff you're looking into, Doyle, you could get yourself killed - or worse.'

'I know that, man,' he shuffled on his bar stool, uncomfortably, 'but this is important. Can y' get it?'

'What's in it for me?'

'What d'y' want?' Doyle asked, 'If it's money … I guess I can get y' money.'

'Not money,' the Miquot demon shook his spiny head, 'next time you win big at the poker table - I want your share of the kittens.'

'Oh - come on - man!' The Irishman began to protest, 'I sell those kittens on to pet shops - I can't let y' just eat a basketful o' tiny tabbies. It wouldn't be right.'

'No kittens - no number - that's the deal. I thought this was important?'

The half demon sighed, it was important. Too important to let slide because his conscience didn't want to be responsible for the deaths of a few baby cats. 'OK,' he agreed, 'whatever I win next time at the poker table - is yours - agreed.'

He kept his words vague. He wasn't promising an exact number of cats. In fact he wasn't promising cats at all - he was promising his next lot of poker winnings… he could win somewhere else, before he returned to his underground demon ring. And if the Miquot wasn't happy - well he could break his legs - they'd just pop back into place, anyhow.

'Agreed,' the Miquot said. They shook on it. 'Now,' the spiny demon took out a pen and pulled a napkin towards him, 'remember what I said - this guy is dangerous - and the places he will send you are dangerous - you need to approach this with care. You're a good half man, Doyle, I'd hate to see you get killed.'

'Ah - you're only sayin' that, 'cause if I die you won't get my winnings.'

'Damn straight - so be careful.' He handed Doyle the napkin with a phone number on it. 'Ring this guy - he'll tell you where to look for answers.'

* * *

Holtz' crew had set up at their new headquarters - they had moved away from Sahjahn's underground chamber and found themselves an abandoned mansion in Silverlake. In a darkened room, two men fought with a chained vampire - using quarterstaffs to beat it. Justine sat nearby, she was perusing the four photographs of Angel's people. 'I don't get it,' she said to Holtz, 'how can these people work for a vampire?'

'I once made a pact with a demon,' Holtz reminded her. But that wasn't the same - she told him. He had only done that so he could get to Angelus - so he could kill a vampire.

He smiled at her, 'I'm sure they believe their reasons are good, no matter how misguided. Things are not always black and white, Justine, good _and_ evil.'

'What about Angelus?'

'He is evil.'

Across the room, the vampire's chains broke loose - and, freed, it dived on the men who had fought it. Justine jumped to her feet and launched herself at the vamp. She slugged it and then kicked it in the chest - knocking it to the ground. Then she grabbed a sword and impaled it through its torso - so it was pinned to the floor. 'Chains would be good now!'

The men came forward again, with the chains - and locked the vampire in place, once more. Justine pulled the sword from its chest - and turned back to Holtz. He was looking pleased with her. 'I knew you were meant for this,' he said. He turned back, to study the papers he had laid out on the table. 'Events are happening even quicker than I could have hoped.'

'Oh good. I was getting bored.' Sahjahn materialised out of nothingness - and stood behind the vampire hunter, looking impatient. Justine swung her sword at the demon's neck to decapitate him - but the blade just passed straight through him. 'You know - my barber has the exact same problem with the scissors,' Sahjahn said to her, sounding unimpressed, 'hence the crappy haircut.'

'You can stand down, Justine,' Holtz told his deputy, 'it's only Sahjahn.'

'Only?' The demon sounded peeved. This was the trouble with Holtz. He didn't show the proper respect - and he hadn't held up his end of the bargain. He looked at where Justine was standing, staring at him, 'can we get a little privacy here?' he asked. She ignored him - and looked at Holtz.

'No,' the vampire hunter replied.

'Fine. You owe me a dead vampire.'

'Yes,' Holtz agreed, 'but what are you going to do about it? Nothing. That's what you'll do. That's all you can do.' He turned away from the incorporeal demon, 'you've played your part Sahjahn, now let me play mine.' Once more he began to examine the papers, but the demon was not done with him.

'And what exactly is your part? Recruiting a bunch of paramilitary moonie freaks, who run around playing candid camera with Angel's buddies? That's crap. Admit it - you're a coward. And I bet Caroline would agree. You remember her, don't you? Your dead wife? Mother of your dead kids? How'd they die? Who swore revenge? Any of this ringing a bell?'

Holtz straightened up - but he did not turn around. 'Get out,' he said.

'Or what? - You can't kill me.'

Now, the vampire hunter turned - and looked the demon dead in the eye. 'No. But I can trap your dimensional essence in a Reisikhian Urn. Wonderful devices, the urns. They last a lifetime - that is, if you live forever.'

'This isn't over, Holtz,' Sahjahn said. But he heeded the warning - and shivered out of existence.

* * *

He rematerialised inside Lilah's office.

The young attorney was in the middle of a phone call with her mother. 'Is everything alright? Are they taking care of you? No, mom, this _is_ Lilah. You called Lilah. Do you need anything? Do you need money?' She listened for a moment, 'no, mom, I can't come over. I'm in Los Angeles. You know that … please don't cry. Mom, please. Stop it.' She noticed the demon. 'I have to go,' she said - and put the phone down on her distressed mother.

'You don't have an appointment,' she said.

'That's it?' Sahjahn was annoyed, 'no "wow how did he do that?", No screaming in terror. You twenty first century types are so jaded.'

'You're Sahjahn, aren't you?' She smirked at his disbelieving expression. 'I might be jaded, but I do my homework. And there's a girl downstairs, she's got records on everything that ever happened. My company rocks.'

Sahjahn was aware of her company - in both this and other dimensions. Lilah smiled - great - so they could get down to business. She summarised his situation. He was a time shifter - he had made Holtz an offer back in the eighteenth century and then put him on ice so he could come and kill Angel here in the twenty first. 'But as I'm yet to put on my boogie shoes and dance on Angel's pile of dust - I'm guessing Holtz isn't working fast enough for you. Which leads me to believe that you think my firm can help expedite the process.'

'More or less.'

She smiled, wryly, and trotted out the company line. Wolfram and Hart did not want Angel dead. The Senior Partners wanted to keep him alive until he became useful, and she was sworn to uphold that policy. But she scribbled on a yellow legal pad, as she spoke - and then held it up for him to read. It was just two words, 'I'm in.'

'Is there some other way I can help you?' she asked him - all innocence, for the benefit of whoever might be listening in. There was always somebody listening in.

Sajahn leaned in close, and lowered his voice. 'I have a plan,' he told her, 'but in order for it to work I'm going to need a special ingredient - something very rare and valuable, almost impossible to get hold of. I'm going to need the blood of Angel's son.'

'Got it,' she smiled.

He looked astounded. She shrugged - she had simply sent someone into the doctor's office to swipe it. It was hardly the heist of the century. Though, she felt she had to warn the demon, the people down in the lab had looked it over. It was completely run of the mill. Completely normal.

'That's because they don't know what they're looking for,' Sahjahn told her.

* * *

Doyle arrived back at the hotel - the place seemed empty, but the door to Wes' office was slightly ajar. He tapped on it and then entered, sure enough the watcher was inside - still poring over his translations. 'Hey, man.'

Wesley looked up, 'did you get it?' he asked. Doyle nodded, and slapped the phone number down on the desk. 'This guy's some kind of all powerful wizard. Deep into the black arts - conjuring, mystical realms - that sorta thing. If anyone can find a way for us to contact the other side - get a bit of guidance from a higher power - then this is the man.'

'Guidance from a higher power,' Wesley gave a dark laugh, 'the chance would be a fine thing. If The Powers wanted us to know what to do, then they could send a vision direct to you - clear all this up in a moment. No. They are choosing to let us fight blind on this. This … guide - whoever it is we end up speaking to - I think we can quite safely say that it will not speak for the powers you work for.'

Doyle shrugged, 'if it knows what it's talkin' about - and it knows more than us - then does it matter what side it's on? We're gettin' into dangerous territory, here, bud - I don't think the old equations of good and evil - balancin' the scales - really matter any more.'

'You're right - it is dangerous,' Wesley said to him, he leaned back in his chair and looked at the half demon, 'and I would understand if you chose to back out now. You would be putting your life at risk if we go through with this and you…' he smiled, but it came out as a pained grimace, 'you have a lot to live for. I'm grateful for you getting me this contact - but I can proceed alone, from here on out.'

But the Irishman shook his head. 'I can't ask you to do this by yourself,' he said, 'we're a team - anyway, if you're right - if Angel is gonna turn evil and … well, we all know what we promised to do if he ever did that. I'm not gonna make you carry this burden alone.'

Wesley nodded, 'Thank you - I'll - I'll make the call now, let you know how it goes.'

* * *

Doyle left him to it - and went to find Cordelia. She was sat out in the courtyard, cradling Connor. She was singing to him, softly… but she stopped when she looked up and saw Doyle standing in the doorway, watching her. 'Hey.'

'Hey,' he replied, 'you on babysittin' duty again?' He kept his voice carefully neutral.

'Just for the moment - Connor needed some fresh air and …' she glanced up at the wide open sky and the sun blazing down on them, 'Angel couldn't exactly come outside with him, right now.'

He nodded - but didn't say anything. He just watched her hold the baby. She wriggled uncomfortably under his gaze. 'You want me to take him back in?' she asked.

'No - no - he needs some fresh air, he should get it.' He left the doorway and went to sit beside her on the bench. He peered into the folds of blankets, looking down at Connor's little face. 'I don't think he looks much like Angel,' he said, after a while, 'his face is too red and scrunched up.'

'He doesn't have the trademark glower, yet,' she smiled, 'but it'll come - in time.'

'D'y' think he'll end up taller than me?'

She laughed, 'not for a while, yet,' she gazed into Connor's scrunched up face, 'it's crazy isn't it?'

'What is?'

'That this tiny little bundle of noise and smells is gonna grow up to be a real person one day. How is that even possible? I mean - look at his little feet …'

Doyle looked at the kicking feet of the baby. He sighed, 'yeah, I seen his feet.'

'Do you want to hold him?'

The Irishman looked alarmed, but Cordy insisted, 'come on - I think it'll make you feel better - he's nice to hold. He's just so squishy.' She forced the baby into his arms - and adjusted his grip, so he was supporting him properly. 'There,' she said, 'it isn't so bad, is it?'

No - he had to admit that it wasn't so bad, after all. He hadn't held Connor before - in all the time he'd been around, he'd avoided it. But it wasn't that bad. In fact it was kind of nice … and he really did have cute little feet. Cordelia was beaming at him, 'what?' he asked.

'You look nice with a baby,' she said, 'you know we really could have one of our own someday. I know not biologically yours - but still yours in all the ways that matter. Don't you think you could get used to this?'

He looked down at the little boy in his arms, and smiled, 'yeah - I guess I could. One day…'

* * *

Wesley listened to the wizard on the other end of the phone - he was kicking up a fuss, asking why he should do this dangerous thing to help the watcher. 'Because it's the right thing to do,' Wesley said to him - his eyes were fixed on the translation of the prophecy - on the words that told him that Angel was destined to kill Connor. The Wizard began to talk again, Wes interrupted him, 'then because I'm paying you an obscene amount of money. Just do it, and call me back.'

He hung up the phone, and took his glasses off. He massaged the bridge of his nose. There was nothing to do now but wait - and worry.

* * *

Fred and Gunn walked along the pier - the place was swarming with people - and the sounds of their voices mingled with the cries coming from the rides, and the loud music that blared out. The whole place smelled like cotton candy and roasted peanuts - and seawater. It didn't seem like a particularly likely place for a nest of vamps to make their home - still, after dark it could be a whole different story. Fred kept her eyes peeled for all the signs of undead infestation: small, dark hiding places; blacked out vans or cars - or just really pale people with bumpy faces.

'I don't think we have to worry about seeing any actual vamps,' Gunn pointed out - pointing to the mid afternoon sun. He was annoyed with the mission. This wasn't work - this was just recon - pointless, as vamps weren't going to be out during the day. It was a waste of his time - and Fred's. So they might as well do something better. He dragged her over to a booth. 'Ring toss! You want me to be all macho and win you something?'

'Charles!' she protested.

'OK - you can be the macho one - see if you can win me that stuffed bunny.'

'This is so wrong.'

'You're right - I don't want the bunny.'

She gave him an exasperated look, 'we're supposed to be working!' she told him. But he disagreed - this wasn't work - _it was pointless recon._

'Still it's our job.'

'Actually, it's my job,' Gunn told her, 'Wes never told me to bring you along. Probably wanted me out of the way so he could chat up my girl.'

She began to protest - Wesley would never … then she cut herself off, 'I'm your girl?'

He smiled at her - but she had moved on and was now worrying. Wesley knew about them? And Gunn had known that he knew - and he hadn't told Fred? Gunn shrugged it off - she knew Wes had been interested in her - now he knew he wasn't in with a shot. What was the big deal?

Fred frowned, 'So - he's our boss - what if he doesn't like the idea of us dating whilst we're working together?'

'Cordy and Doyle have been dating since … forever - nobody minded when it was them. He can have a personal problem about it all he likes - but he can't fire us for dating.'

'He's the boss - he probably could.'

'Yeah right - you think Angel and the others would let him - when it was so obvious he was doing it to be petty? Besides - as long as we're getting the job done, he'll have no cause for complaint. He's known for days - and he hasn't fired us yet.'

'OK - but that means we 100% gotta stay focused when we're working. Keep the dating stuff for dating - and the work stuff for work.'

'Nope,' he stepped closer to her, 'I want it all - the great girl and the great job. And I'm not giving up either without a fight.' He grinned at her, 'Now, Doyle manages to gets that balance right - so why would you think I can't?'

She grinned back. And he leaned down to kiss her, 'now what say we go find us some vampires?' he said. And he wrapped his arm around her and they walked off down the pier to hunt.

* * *

The wizard had finally got back to Wesley - he had an address - a location for a conduit to a higher being. He went to find Angel.

The vampire was out in the lobby - he had put Connor in his bassinet and was shaking a stuffed animal at him. 'Look who's coming at you … woosh…' he smushed the toy into the baby's face - and Connor gurgled with delight.

Wesley came up behind him, 'I need to leave the office for a moment,' he told the vampire.

Angel twisted so he could look up at him,'what's going on?'

'What do you mean?'

'You've been on edge for days - talk to me.' He picked up his mug of blood and took a sip.

'I just want to make sure everything is OK.'

'You mean with Connor?'

Wesley nodded, and Angel turned back to his son - shaking the toy once more. 'You didn't mean to give Uncle Wesley such a headache now, did you?'

'I won't be long.'

Angel didn't turn back around - he continued to play with his baby, 'give us a smile.' Connor smiled, 'yeah!' his father celebrated. Wesley turned to leave - and now Angel stopped him, 'hey, Wes,' the watcher turned back and their eyes met for a moment. 'Thanks for doing this, you're a good friend.' Wesley nodded - and walked away. Angel went back to playing with Connor, 'here's the monkey - yay yay yay!'

...

As he glanced up, he saw the British man stop at the counter and speak to Doyle. After a moment, the half demon grabbed his leather jacket - gave Cordy a swift kiss goodbye, and then left the hotel with the other man. Angel picked up Connor - and went to go talk to his business manager. 'Doyle's going along too?'

She turned to look over her shoulder at him - she was working at her computer - and smiled when she saw him with Connor. 'Yeah - they think they've had some big break through or something … it's all very hush hush… they want to double check that they're on the right path before they tell everyone else.'

'That's what Wes wanted to talk to Doyle about this morning?'

She nodded and turned back to her computer.

Angel began to fret, 'so why didn't he just talk to me about it?'

She twisted back - and fixed her brightest smile in place. She knew the real answer was because - whatever the men knew - it was bad news. But they had all agreed not to tell Angel until they knew for sure - so as not to worry him, unnecessarily.

'Angel,' she said to him, kindly, 'this morning I watched you freak out because your son's digestive system is working normally - you have way too much on your mind to be able to make room for thinking about any leads that might turn out to be big fat raspberries. They'll check it out - whatever it is - and then they'll either verify it and tell you, or find out they were wrong and start again from scratch. But you are way too emotionally stunted to deal with every blind alley and false start they chase whilst Wes is working on the prophecy. They'll tell you about the big stuff. Don't sweat it.'

'I guess … emotionally stunted?'

She grinned again, 'you know it!'

'I don't know … I think I'm .. getting better - at - connecting… to people.'

'If you say so,' she began to type.

'What are you doing?'

'Running our new client's credit check - Aubrey Wilson … oh - hey - that's weird.'

'What is it?' the vampire leaned down so he could peer over her shoulder. He was very close to her - and she gave him a half glance before concentrating back on the screen.

'Well - according to this - Aubrey Wilson is way over extended on credit. She doesn't have a job - not for the past year. She's been paying everything on her credit cards, including hiring a private detective back then and,' she wrinkled her face up in confusion, 'she owes an outstanding amount to Tillier and Sons' Masonry company.'

'Well - they probably made her son's grave stone.'

'Yeah - but she said her son died last Monday - this bill goes back to last March … why would she buy her son a gravestone a year before he died?'

'Maybe somebody else died - her mother or…'

'I'm running a check on obits for people named Timmy Wilson,' Cordelia said to him, 'this seems all kinds of wrong to me.' She typed into the search engine bar - an obituary for a young man came up. The date was from February 2001. 'I told you this wasn't right,' Cordelia said.

* * *

Once night had fallen, the pier had quietened down. Now the rides were switched off and all the people had left. But Fred and Gunn were still out hunting for vampires. 'We should be getting back,' she said - but Gunn held up a hand to quiet her. He had heard something - he sensed something: 'Hold up - I'm getting a tingle.'

'I thought we were gonna try and keep that out of the workplace?'

He looked at her, 'not that kinda tingle.'

'Oh,' she looked around - scanning the pier for any sign of unlife. 'I don't see anything suspicious …' she trailed off as she saw something suspicious, 'apart from that man trying to break into that building over there.'

It was the building which housed the carousel. The carousel had closed hours ago. They followed the figure inside - and saw it climbing up the middle column of the ride. 'Is that a vampire?' Fred asked.

'One way to find out,' he pulled a stake out of his jacket.

'Charles, what are you doing?'

'My job. I didn't spend all day walking the pier so I could go home and file a report with Wesley. Let's finish this.'

'We're not supposed to,' she looked around the dark and deserted building. The carousel began to turn, silently. With no music playing it was eerie - creepy. The door in the middle column burst open - the booth where the operator normally sat - a vampire came out, growling. And then another vampire dropped down from the ceiling. And a third stepped out of the shadows from across the room.

This had been a trap, all along...


	55. Loyalty: Part Three

Justine and another of Holtz' followers watched through an opening in the building, as the vampires surrounded Fred and Gunn. Justine held a camcorder - and was taping the whole thing.

...

'When I say run - run,' Gunn urged Fred, he turned to face two of the vamps - taking them both on at once. The third rushed him, and he ducked - allowing one of the other vampires to take the hit instead. 'Get out of here!' he yelled at his girlfriend.

'But….'

'Go!'

Fred ran out - and Gunn returned to his fighting.

...

Just outside - Justine and her companion continued to watch the fight. 'They're going to kill him,' the man said.

'Maybe.' She kept the camera pointing straight at Gunn - recording his every move. Her voice was dispassionate, as she considered the likelihood of his death.

...

The street fighter was pinned to the ground by one of the vampires. He hit it - a hard right cross - and then launched it over his head. It went flying through the air and crashed into the wooden railing that surrounded the carousel. It smashed through the barrier and splinters of wood flew out in every direction. Gunn rolled to his feet, picked up his stake and threw himself down on top of the fallen vamp, plunging the stake deep into its heart. It exploded in a cloud of dust. But even as the first vampire disintegrated - the second had grabbed Gunn and tossed him across the room. The street fighter landed heavily on the floor, his stake fell from his hand - and before he had a chance to right himself, the vampire had grabbed him and was holding him up in the air by his throat.

...

Justine and the man watched on - as Gunn had the life choked from him. 'Shouldn't we do something…?' the man suggested.

But Holtz' deputy shook her head. 'That's not why we're here.' She kept on filming.

...

The third vampire was sneaking up on Gunn - even as the street fighter still dangled helplessly in the air. 'Behind you!' Fred had returned to the carousel - and cried out to warn her boyfriend of the approaching danger. She picked up his fallen stake and threw it to him. He caught it and plunged it backwards - straight into the third vampire's heart, just as Fred staked the second vampire through the back. Both demons turned to dust - and Gunn dropped back to the floor.

...

'Well, what do you know?' Justine said, smiling grimly. She switched the camera off and walked away, as Gunn asked what Fred was still doing there.

'I got your back,' the woman replied, then she began to smile, 'well actually, I got his back.'

...

Gunn chuckled, 'thank you.' Fred wrapped her arms around him, and they kissed - and then Gunn's cell began to ring. He took it out and answered it, 'hello? Oh hey Cordy...' he raised an eyebrow at Fred, as he listened to what Cordelia was telling him, 'a trap you say? Yeah it's OK - we got it covered, we're headed back to the hotel, now.'

* * *

Wesley and Doyle made their way through some deep bushes, the watcher was carrying an electronic compass - and was reeling off the directions, as they went. 'Thirty four degrees twelve minutes north, one eighteen, twenty one, West.'

'Uh - Wesley? I think we've gone wrong,' Doyle said, looking around, 'I think you might have read the compass wrong.' But, just then, the compass let out a soft chime - telling them they were in the correct spot.

Wesley shrugged, 'this must be it,' and he looked up - and saw what Doyle had been looking at. 'It's supposed to be a statue,' he said, sounding annoyed. Instead, it was a giant, plastic hamburger, with arms and legs, and an "order here" speaker for a nose. The pair of them were stood outside a fast food restaurant - in the drive in line. As they stood there, the lights in the restaurant went out and the last two workers came outside and locked up. They stared at the two men, stood gazing at the plastic hamburger, for a moment - and then shrugged and left them to it. They didn't get paid enough to defend the premises from burglars.

'Well - I suppose - technically it is a statue,' Wesley reasoned to Doyle, once they were alone once more.

'Technically…'

'If this doesn't work - I'm gonna kill that wizard,' the watcher said, he took out a pouch and sprinkled the mystical powder it contained over the plastic hamburger.

'This doesn't feel right,' Doyle mumbled. 'This can't be a conduit to the nether world - it's ridiculous.' He watched as the powder landed on the plastic, and nothing happened, 'so what now?'

Wesley raised his hands - his fingers spread and his palms facing the burger. He began to chant . ' _Manga sec Loa, algeba_. Accept this offering and open the gates of truth.'

There was a sudden flash of light, which made the men blink and take a step backwards - and then the plastic hamburger began to grow in size - until it towered over the pair of them, and glared down at them. It's eyes glowed red. 'How dare you call on the Loa?' It demanded.

'We come in supplication, oh great one,' Wesley said to the giant, talking hamburger. 'Begging the answers to questions that only your power can reveal.'

'You know the answers, human - what you seek now is the question.'

'Well - this is officially the craziest thing I ever saw,' Doyle murmured, gazing up into the red eyes of the animated plastic higher power.

But beside him, Wesley had turned pale - as he recognised the words from his own dream. 'Is it true?' he asked, 'will Angel really kill his son, as it says in the prophecies?'

'That the vampire will devour his child is certain,' The Loa told them. The two men exchanged a dismayed glance. 'The dark question you harbour is only "when?".'

'No,' Wesley disagreed, 'the dark question I harbour is "how do I stop it?"'

'It cannot be stopped.'

But Wesley was not accepting that answer. It had to be stopped - there had to be a way… The Loa growled in displeasure, and lightning crackled from his eyes, knocking the British man to the ground. Doyle was down at his side in a instant, helping him back up, 'hey - hey - easy!' he admonished the Loa.

'The human's insolence is displeasing,' The Loa said.

Wesley struggled back to his feet, aided by his Irish friend. 'You try talking to a cranky hamburger,' he muttered.

'You risk your life, human, calling on the Loa. Perhaps what you really seek is death. The pain in your heart begs for it.'

'Woah woah woah!' Doyle interrupted, 'there's no need for that .. we just…'

But he was cut off by Wesley's reply. 'Then do it and be done, nothing else will stop me.'

Doyle looked between the watcher and the hamburger, 'OK - did everyone take their _insane_ pills this morning? We're here for help - we wanna help Angel. We wanna save Connor. We don't need death threats and macho pissin' contests… that won't achieve anythin'.' He looked at the Loa, 'please, just tell us what to do.'

'Simple mortals,' the Loa scoffed, 'your pain is just beginning. Betrayal and agony lie in wait. Time is running out. And yet still you ignore the question.'

'OK,' Wesley said, looking into the Loa's glowing red eyes, ' _when_ will this happen?'

'The first portent will shake the earth. The second will burn the air. The third will turn the sky to blood.'

'An earthquake?' Wesley was incredulous, 'is the first portent? We live in southern California.'

'Earthquake, fire, blood,' The Loa roared, 'heed these signs, mortals, and trouble the Loa no more.' And with that, the red light faded from its eyes and it shrunk back down to regular size - an inanimate object once more. The two men stared at each other.

* * *

Lilah sat at the bar and ordered a drink, whilst she waited for Sahjahn. They were meeting here so they could talk more freely. She had good news. As she finished her whisky, the demon materialised beside her, 'sorry I'm late,' he said.

She didn't even look at him, 'it's on.'

'It's on?'

'Our plan. The Angel plan. It's on.' She had outsourced the labour - and found a way to bury the costs. Wolfram and Hart should never be any the wiser. She got up to leave.

'OK,' Sahjahn said sarcastically, 'but let's skip the small talk and just get right down to business. I just time skipped a hundred and thirty three years for this meeting. Would a little conversation kill you?'

But Lilah Morgan had no time and no intention of chatting up demons just because they happened to be working on the same nefarious scheme. She was, however, willing to mine him for more information. If he wanted conversation, then it would be strictly on her terms. 'Why do you want Angel dead?' she asked, 'it's the only thing I couldn't find in the archives.'

'Boy, all work and no play,' he turned away from her, 'I have my reasons.'

'Hmm.'

'How about you?' he asked, 'dyed in the wool company gal. Why risk it all to kill Angel?'

'We - have our history,' she told him.

'Well - same here.'

But Lilah wasn't letting this slide. He was the one that was so keen to get chatty. 'Are you afraid of him?'

Sahjahn scoffed at her words, 'nah.'

'Then what are you afraid of?' She leaned in closer, 'you may be insubstantial but - I can still smell the fear.'

The demon looked uncomfortable, 'wow, where does the time go?' He stood up - but before he shimmered out of this reality - he asked one last question. 'When does this plan start?'

She smiled her shark's smile. 'It's already started.'

* * *

The two men sat in a booth at the British theme pub. They had gone there because they knew they would not be disturbed. It was a human bar - and they knew precious few humans. Especially not ones that frequented theme pubs. The music was loud - Sex Pistols tonight - and they could talk freely underneath the din.

'So … what are y' thinkin'?' Doyle asked, taking a sip of his pint. It was a Guinness. He should have got an Old Speckled Hen or a Theakston Old Peculier, being in a British theme pub and all - but, hey - this place was a home from home for Wesley - so there was no harm in Doyle having a little taste of home as well. 'Do we trust this Loa guy?'

'Almost certainly not,' Wesley replied, 'he is … a manifestation of dark magicks. An oracle of sorts, yes … but higher powers tend to speak _a_ truth - not _the_ truth. Nevertheless - that isn't to say he wasn't correct.'

Doyle shook his head, 'y' lost me.'

'What I mean,' Wesley leaned forward on the table - bringing his head closer to Doyle's, 'is that - like all oracles we have had cause to speak with - the Loa is not interested in serving our purpose. It has no interest in helping us - it is not our friend. Therefore to trust it, blindly, would be … foolish. However - it can see truths that we cannot. So to ignore it entirely would be, likewise, foolish.'

'So - what d'y' suggest?'

'We remain cautious - vigilant - but we not rush into anything.'

'You mean keep an eye out for those signs he mentioned?'

Wesley leaned back - and sighed - 'yes - those signs - an earthquake? Here?' He glanced around at the Union Jacks that adorned the walls: 'you know - if this were happening on our side of the Atlantic, I might be inclined to take that warning a bit more seriously - but Southern California?'

'Earthquakes happen all the time,' Doyle finished.

'Yes - which makes me wonder if the Loa weren't trying to rush us into something - some kind of action that could spell disaster for us all. So, like I said, caution. We wait and see.'

'You're the boss,' Doyle said, taking another sip of his drink.

'You know - I'm glad you're here, Doyle,' Wesley said, all of sudden. 'I'm glad you came along tonight - and that you're here to talk things over with. I don't know what I would do if I had to keep this all to myself. Bear this burden alone…' His tone was warm … grateful, and it was reflected in the warmth of his blue eyes.

Doyle nodded, and took another drink. 'We're family,' he said, 'none of us should have to face anything alone.'

* * *

The next morning, Wesley sat by himself in the lobby and stared at Connor, as the baby lay sleeping in his bassinet. This couldn't be going to happen, he thought to himself. The Loa was wrong - speaking in riddles - making up portents. They could figure this out. He and Doyle would find a solution - there was still time - there had to be.

He glanced up, as he heard a noise by the counter, and saw Aubrey Wilson standing there. 'I'm sorry to interrupt your staring,' she said to him, smiling, 'you seemed really into it.'

'I'm sorry - I didn't hear you come in,' he stood up and led the way over to his office, 'please..' she followed him inside, and then took hold of his hand and shook it.

'I got your message that everything was taken care of. I - can't tell you how grateful I am.' She took a cheque out of her purse and handed it to Wesley. 'It might have been too late for Timmy - but at least those monsters will never have a chance to take someone else's son.'

'Monsters?' he walked away from her, heading to his desk. 'I don't recall mentioning that there were more than one.'

She took a step closer, 'well - you did say before that there could be a nest.'

'Oh.' He put the cheque into a drawer, and then looked back up at her. 'Well, thanks for the cheque - we'll mail you the receipt.'

Aubrey watched him for a moment. 'Look - I know it isn't any of my business - but are you OK?' He glanced up at her in surprise. 'I mean - no offence or anything,' she said, 'but you look a little - rough around the edges.'

'I haven't been sleeping well.'

'Would you like to go out? Maybe - get a cup of coffee or something?'

'With you?' He lowered his brow, quizzically.

Aubrey sighed. 'To be honest with you - I could use a friend right now,' she told him, 'ever since my son … it gets lonely.'

Wesley nodded, slightly. 'You're good,' he replied, 'I like the "lonely" thing.'

'What?' she looked confused.

'Yeah, lonely,' Angel said, walking onto the office behind her, 'it was a nice touch.'

She whipped around so that she was facing the vampire. Her hand went straight to her purse and she pulled out a stake. He caught her upraised arm and knocked her off balance. She dropped the stake and Angel caught her by the throat. He raised his eyebrows, 'moves more like a fighter than a victim, wouldn't you say, Wes?'

'Yes I would.'

'You set my friends up,' Angel accused the woman. 'Let them walk right into an ambush, they could have been killed.'

'But they weren't! Your friends are still alive. My little boy isn't!'

Angel let go of her throat, and took a step back. 'I'm sorry about your son,' he said to her. He meant it, as well. He truly was sorry that this woman had had to suffer in this way. Since Connor was born … Angel couldn't bear to imagine the pain she must be in. But that didn't mean he could let the attempted murder of his friends just slide.

'Is that how Holtz found you?' Wesley asked, 'because of what happened to your son?'

She glanced between the two men - but didn't say anything.

'You're right to protect him,' Angel said to her, 'Holtz is a good man. He has every right to hate me. And if he ever comes close to one of my people ever again - or so much as touches a hair on my son's head - I'll kill him, and anyone who gets in the way. You might wanna mention that.'

Aubrey stared at the vampire for a long, silent moment - and then she turned and ran out of the building.

As she did, the books on Wes' desk began to shake - and then the whole building began to rattle - as a minor earthquake shook the hotel.

Angel ran back out into the lobby - to get to Connor. But by the time he had reached him, the place was still once more. He picked up the crying baby. 'Hey, that's my little guy … you're first earthquake, huh?'

* * *

Cordelia and Doyle had stopped off at a Starbucks on their way into work. They had just been served and were leaving the coffee shop, when the earthquake hit. Sheltered in the doorway, they watched the tables and chairs begin to rattle and bounce along the floor. People screamed, as their coffee was shaken straight off the table, and cups smashed on the ground - spilling out the hot liquid. Then everything became still again. There was a moment of quiet, and then somebody started to giggle. The baristas came out from behind the counter to sweep up the broken cups and mop up the spilt coffee.

Cordelia turned to leave - and then noticed Doyle, frozen to the spot - his face pale. He was just staring at a smashed coffee cup, watching the brown liquid spread out into a larger and larger puddle. 'Are you OK?' she asked, 'it was just a little one.' She frowned, 'it wasn't your first time, was it?'

He shook himself, and tore his gaze away from the spilled coffee - looking into her face. 'Uh - no - no I've...I've been in earthquakes before. I'm just …' he ran out of things to say.

'Well, I just hope it wasn't a portent of something bad,' Cordelia said, briskly.

'What?' he stared at her in alarm.

She shrugged, 'one time there was an earthquake that was ushering in the end of times - Buffy died and everything - earthquakes can be portentous.' She saw the panic on his face, and smiled, 'I'm teasing!' she said to him, 'jeez, don't pull a total wig on me… we live in southern California,' she unknowingly echoed Wesley's words from the previous evening, 'shifting land masses, fault lines, tectonic whoosits … this stuff happens all the time. No biggie.'

'Yeah,' he cleared his throat and shook himself again, 'yeah - shiftin' land masses, no big.'

She slid her arm through his and pulled him out of the store, 'come on - we'll be late.'

* * *

Holtz' group gathered around the t.v screen. They were watching the recording Justine had made of the fight, the night before. On screen, Gunn threw the first vampire over his head and dispatched it, before taking a serious beating from the next vamp. Fred ran back into shot. 'Behind you!' she cried.

Holtz paused the tape, just as Fred threw the dropped stake to Gunn. 'This tiny girl,' he said, 'outsized, outmatched and outnumbered. And she survived.' He turned to the group. 'Why? Because she was willing not to. She was prepared to die for the cause rather than abandon her comrade.' He looked fiercely into the eyes of his individual followers. 'We too must be willing to die - but more so. Study this carefully,' he told them, 'you'll be fighting these two very soon.' He heard footsteps echo through the mansion, and frowned to himself, 'perhaps even sooner than I expected.'

Aubrey appeared in the room. She was not supposed to be here. She was supposed to have taken their leader - Wyndam Pryce - out of the office, got him alone - got him to lower his guard … and then find out everything he knew. Her presence here, instead, could only mean one thing. 'They found you out,' he said to her.

'I am sorry.'

'It's not important,' he said. Sending someone undercover was always a risk. So the vampire and his people were better than Holtz had hoped - it was good to know that, even if the information was unwelcome. There was a more pressing matter than Aubrey's failure at deception, however. 'Of course I am rather annoyed that you allowed yourself to be followed,' he said to her.

'Don't blame her.'

Aubrey and the rest of the team all span around to face the direction the voice had come from. Wesley was standing in the doorway: 'I would have found you eventually.'


	56. Loyalty: Part Four

Doyle and Cordelia arrived at the hotel to find Angel cradling Connor. 'Hey guys,' the vampire greeted them, 'did you feel the earthquake? Connor didn't like it too much, did you, little guy?'

'Yeah we felt it,' Cordelia said, putting her purse down and switching on her computer, 'did it do any damage, is anything broken?' She glanced around the room - looking for signs of structural damage to the hotel.

'Nah,' Angel replied, 'it was just an itty bitty one.' He turned back to Connor, 'an itty bitty one, yes it was - you'll have to get used to bigger quakes than that.'

Doyle cleared his throat - looking at Angel, and the way he was holding Connor, very carefully. 'How about you, man?' he asked, 'how are you feelin' this mornin'?'

Angel looked surprised to be asked - he and Doyle hadn't really been civil towards each other for a long time, now. 'I'm fine.'

'Yeah? You're not feelin'... I dunno - evil? Or bloodthirsty?'

The vampire gave him a strange look. 'I'm fine,' he repeated.

''Cause y' know - if you were feelin' like somethin' was … amiss … you should tell your friends, and we can help.'

Angel laid Connor down in his crib and crossed over to the fridge, taking out a mug of blood. He shot suspicious glances at Doyle the whole time. 'What's with him?' he asked Cordelia.

She looked up from her computer and glanced between the two demons. 'Oh, he's just freaking out because of the earthquake - he thinks it's portending something sinister.'

'Yeah, right…' the vampire chuckled, 'remember that time there was an earthquake - and Buffy died?'

'Yeah - that story doesn't exactly make him feel better, surprisingly enough. We just have to be sensitive - and let the earthquake virgin have a total wig.'

'I've been in other earthquakes!' Doyle protested.

Cordy rolled her eyes, 'guys are always upping their count,' she muttered, 'like they think we can't tell.'

* * *

One of Holtz' followers drew a knife and stalked closer to Wesley. 'Perhaps we should cut out his tongue - send a message to Angelus.'

Wesley looked completely unfazed by the suggestion. 'Maybe,' he said - and then hauled back and punched the man, dropping him to the ground. 'Or perhaps you can just lie on the floor and gag for a while.' He looked around the rest of the group - and Holtz raised a hand to prevent them from attacking the watcher.

'I didn't come here to fight,' Wesley said. 'I am not your enemy,' he took a few steps further into the room, 'but then I notice you have some trouble making that distinction.' He fixed Holtz with a firm stare, holding eye contact for a long moment. 'You are fighting the wrong man,' he told the vampire hunter.

'Angelus.'

'No,' he corrected, 'Angel. He's not Angelus any more. He is a good man.'

'He's not a man at all.'

'Nevertheless - he has a soul now.' Wesley understood where Holtz was coming from. This black and white thinking was the same he had learned back at the watcher's academy. Good and evil. Us and them. Human and demon. But it was his time with Angel where he had actually become a part of the good fight - actually done some good in this world, achieved what it was that the watcher's council pretended they stood for. And it was where he had learned about the shades of grey - that things were not as simple as the theorists and academics of the council would have their young wards believe.

He knew now that creatures of evil could be redeemed - if they wanted to be. And that demons could be trusted and much loved brothers. What Holtz was chasing no longer existed - it belonged in that simpler world. But they were men who lived in the real one - and they had to act accordingly. Angel's soul made him different to other vampires - and it meant that he was different to the other creature who sometimes wore his face. Angel was not Angelus - and must not be punished for the other's crimes.

But Holtz did not see it that way. He was still living in a world of black and white - at least when it came to the monster who had murdered his wife and infant son … and defiled his beloved daughter, making her a creature of evil - just like himself. Holtz was pleased about Angel's soul - impressed with the creative vengeance of the gypsies - gladdened that Angelus must feel the pain of all the crimes he had committed, the wrongs he had done. But still, justice had not been served. That was what Holtz was here for.

'If it's a sacrifice you require - take me,' Wesley said to him. Angel meant a lot to Wesley - in many ways he was his saviour; just as much as he had saved countless damsels in alleyways - so too had he saved Wesley. Not just his life - from demons and a psychotic slayer … but his soul. Before coming here, Wesley had been a miserable failure of a man. A pompous twit, a snivelling coward. He had failed his slayer, failed the council and failed his father. And he had been abandoned in America - completely alone. But now he was a warrior, an expert and a leader. He believed in his own abilities, he believed in himself. And he had a family and a place in the world. It was Angel who had given him all this - and so protecting the vampire was more important to Wesley than he could begin to explain. He owed Angel everything - and so he would do anything for him - whatever it took to keep him safe, and to keep Connor safe. 'Angel is no more responsible for Angelus' crimes than I am.'

'Really?' Holtz sounded politely disbelieving.

'Yes.'

'And was it your hands that held down my beloved Caroline as she was violated and murdered? Your hands that wrapped themselves around my infant son's neck and snapped it like kindling? Were yours the hands that clutched at my daughter, as she was turned into a creature damned for all eternity? Angelus is in his nature. The beast will reemerge.'

He looked into Wesley's face - and seemed to read something there, some tremor that gave the watcher away. 'And you've seen it,' Holtz concluded, realising this man had come face to face with Angelus, himself - and was still pretending that Angel was a thing worth saving. 'You know it - and that is why you are here.' He pondered for a moment. 'You are afraid that he is going to kill the child - and you are right.'

Wesley glanced between Holtz and Aubrey, 'you're infiltration was more successful than I'd realised,' he said - fighting to maintain neutrality in his voice. But his heart was thumping. Angel's mortal and oldest enemy knew the secret - the secret that even Angel did not know. And that gave Holtz power.

'I don't need prophecies to tell me what is plain. So long as the child remains with a demon, it's not safe.'

Wesley shoved his hands in his pockets, and tried to sound scathing, as he spoke. 'Well, I must have misunderstood. Here I was thinking it was a matter of simple blood vengeance. When what you really want is to protect Angel's son.'

'You don't believe me?'

'Maybe it's the low scary voice that is giving me the trouble.'

Holtz folded his arms and smiled - a brief, wry smile. 'It's time to make a decision Mr. Wyndam Pryce. My army is strong - and will only increase in size. Fight against us and it will be a bloodbath.'

'This isn't war,' Wesley told him evenly, 'it's revenge.'

'And what's wrong with revenge?' Asked Justine, stepping forward, 'for some of us it's all we have left.'

'Look. I can't know what it's been like for any of you…'

'You might soon enough,' Holtz interrupted him. Wesley stared. 'When I put my son's body in the ground, I had to open the coffin - to check he was really in there,' the vampire hunter told the watcher, 'you may also discover, Mr. Wyndam Pryce, that a child's coffin - it weighs nothing.'

Wesley could think of no reply to that statement.

* * *

Fred and Gunn sat in their usual booth in their usual diner. It was dark outside - and it was beginning to rain, lightly. Gunn just pushed the food around his plate with his fork, he had barely had two mouthfuls. Fred watched him. 'You've barely touched your food,' she said softly, 'are you feeling OK?'

He looked up at her, 'yeah - I was just thinking about stuff - us, work … Wes.'

She swallowed nervously. 'Wesley? What about Wesley?'

'I'm just thinking … you know what we talked about yesterday - about how he could fire us just for dating. But I don't think he will.'

'You don't?'

'Nah,' he shook his head, 'that's just not Wes - he isn't petty and small.' He sighed, deeply. 'But he is the boss - and we gotta respect that. His job is to keep things tight - that's a lot of pressure. And maybe we don't help him none when we go around macking on the job.'

'Are you changing your mind?' she asked him. Her voice was small, but she kept her eyes fixed steadily on the man in front of her, 'about us having it all? I mean - provided we're not smooching on the job, or getting sucked underground by a murderous plant demon - I say, why not go for it?'

Gun smiled. 'What if we can't manage it? The job - the romance. Emotions can be tricky. They can cloud our judgement. Like at the carousel, last night - what if it doesn't work?'

Fred looked sad, 'what if it has to come down to a choice?' she asked him.

He sighed, and leaned back on the bench. 'I've been fighting vamps and demons since I was a kid,' he told her. 'That sense of doing good - of waking up in the morning and making the world safer - better. I've always had that.'

Fred dropped her eyes. She got it. She stared down at the creases in the napkin folded on her lap - and tried not to feel crushed. A slow smile spread across Gunn's face as he watched her. 'But I aint never had a Fred, before.' She looked back up at him, and he leaned forward and took her hand. 'If I have to - I choose you…' then he looked a little uncertain, 'did I come on too strong?'

She shook her head, smiling, 'no - you came on just right.' They sat for a while, holding hands across the table. 'You know,' Fred said after a while, 'I don't think it'll come down to a choice. We've seen for ourselves first hand that workplace romances can work out great … and it's not like we're part of the only love triangle in the office.'

Gunn looked confused, 'we're not?'

Fred shook her head - was she only the one in the whole damn hotel with eyes, or something? 'No - there's Angel and Doyle and Cordy, and they rub along just fine.'

'Wait up wait up wait up!' Gunn protested, 'are you saying that _Angel_ is in love with _Doyle_? Is that why they've been so pissy with each other of late?'

'No!' she giggled. 'Angel loves Cordelia.'

' _That's_ why Doyle has been so pissy of late!'

'Uhuh,' Fred nodded, 'but they all still manage to work together just fine - nobody has been kicked out of the family, or made to make a choice. So things will be fine for us, as well.'

'Hey, I trust Wesley,' Gunn said to her, 'he's a good man - in the end, he always does the right thing.'

* * *

Wesley walked back to the hotel, alone, in the rain. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know what to think. His every step was heavy, as if his feet were weighed down with lead - and that echoed the heaviness in his heart. He couldn't get the image out of his mind - of Holtz having to open his son's coffin, to check the tiny baby was really inside. The fresh heartbreak - the raw grief - the vampire hunter must have felt when he realised that his son was there, but he was so tiny - so insubstantial - that it was as if he had never been.

Holtz had put his son in the ground. But it was Angelus who had caused that to be. It was Angel - and Darla - who had taken this man's son and snuffed out his tiny life. And now they had a tiny son of their own - and prophecy told them that Angelus was as much a threat to this boy as he had been to the other.

Wesley did not want to experience Holtz' grief, first hand - and did not want Angel to have to either. The idea of opening the coffin … and seeing Connor's little face inside, so peaceful he might be sleeping… even the thought of it was too much to bear. The Loa had said that their pain and agony was only just beginning. Worse was yet to come. But the Loa inhabited a giant talking hamburger...

It had given him portents to watch for - and that must be what he would do. Until he saw those three signs - he would hope for the best. Prepare for the worst - of course - but hope for the best. And he wouldn't burden Angel. It was enough that he could share this load with Doyle. Angel must not know about the prophecy. Wesley knew enough about Greek mythology to know of the dangers of trying to prevent prophecy. Of the way they would self fulfil - _because_ of the action taken in order to circumvent them.

No - he would keep this a secret - apart from from Doyle - and together they would watch for the signs. But until then - there was nothing to be done….

* * *

Cordelia and Doyle had decided to stay the night at the hotel. It had been a long, boring day - after the excitement with the earthquake right at the start. No clients, no visions, no monsters … nothing. They had given up and gone up to Doyle's room. The television was switched on - an early episode of _Friends_ was on. But neither of them were really watching it - they had both seen it several times before. Such was the nature of syndication.

They were ready for bed - and under the covers - sitting propped up against the pillows. Doyle had his arms folded across his chest and his head bowed, as he ruminated on that morning's earthquake - and what it might mean.

'You OK?' Cordelia said to him, 'you've been quiet all day. What gives?'

His head snapped up, 'nothin'.'

She gave him a disbelieving look.

'No really - I'm fine… just thoughtful.'

'Uhuh - and these thoughts that you're thinking are?'

'Nothin'.'

'Doyle!' she let out an exasperated laugh, and then reached up to stroke his hair. 'You know you never told me about what went on with your's and Wesley's field trip last night - you were very late home. Did something happen? You promised to tell me as soon as you knew something.'

She was right - he had. But what could he tell her? Wesley had decided they should keep it quiet - and he was the boss - besides, Cordy would power freak if she heard the content of the prophecy, and if she thought there was a chance Angelus might return. He decided to give her a half truth - or maybe a quarter truth. Not a lie exactly - just truth lite.

'I guess it was kind of a bust,' he told her. 'We followed some instructions from a wizard to go talk to a mystical whoosit. One angry, giant hamburger later - and we're none the wiser. I think we're gonna have to dig deeper but … we don't know where to look - yet.'

'You'll figure it out,' she kissed him, lightly, and he smiled - pleased she had confidence in him. 'So are you gonna tell me what you thought the prophecy said?' she asked.

He shrugged. 'It was about Connor. About some danger he's in … we were tryin' to find out if it was true - and when it might happen but,' he shrugged again, 'we don't know what to think - hence the digging deeper… don't mention any o' this to Angel though - he couldn't handle knowin' there was a threat to Connor and not knowin' how to fight it. It's kinder to keep him in the dark. And don't tell Wes I told you - I wasn't supposed to.'

She laughed, 'tell him what - could you _be_ any more vague?'

'Nice Chandler impression.'

'Thanks.' She grinned. 'So is this all that's bothering you - not knowing what to do next?'

'Well - it is pretty heavy stuff,' he told her. 'It is kinda weighin' on me.'

'Yeah?' she arched an eyebrow, 'is there anything I could do to make you feel better?' She slipped a hand up the inside of his t-shirt.

He leaned in towards her, smiling, 'I can maybe think o' one or two things,' he told her kissing her. She kissed him back, wrapping her other arm around his neck and then climbing up onto his lap. He dropped kisses onto her neck, and down her chest - unbuttoning her pajama shirt, as he went.

She wound her fingers into his hair and pulled his face up so she was kissing him again - slipping her tongue into his mouth. Then she paused. 'Doyle?' she said mid kiss.

'Uhuh?' He was still running his hands all over her.

'Angry, giant hamburger?'

He stopped what he was doing - they pulled apart slightly - and just stared at each other.

* * *

Wesley arrived at the door to Angel's suite of rooms - it was ajar. He tapped on it and Angel invited him in; the vampire was just putting Connor into his crib, for the night.

The baby was grisling, 'it's OK,' his father hushed him, 'I'll get you some food - you're hungry, aren't you?' He went over to the kitchenette and spoke to Wesley, as he did so. 'Did you have a nice walk?' He lit the gas stove, 'how're you doing - really?'

Wesley thought for a moment. 'I've had better days,' he admitted.

'I know the feeling,' he set the baby bottle into a pan of water on the stove, and then went over to fold Connor's laundry. He sat down. 'I just keep thinking about that spy Holtz sent - Aubrey. I mean - I'm angry she put Fred and Gunn's lives in jeopardy, sure I am … but I totally get why she did it.'

Wesley watched him, quietly folding his son's blankets and sleeper suits, as the bottle heated up on the stove - the very picture of blissful domesticity. 'Because you would have done the same in her situation,' he said. He sat down on the edge of the bed.

Angel nodded. 'It scares me, you know,' he admitted. 'something like that happening to Connor - I don't know…' he looked down at the blanket he had just folded, 'I love my son.'

'Love can be a terrible thing,' Wesley said, slowly. Nothing could hurt like love. Nothing could sting like the loss of love. Nothing could crush you - weigh you down quite so much - as having your heart dependent on another person, beating for another person. It was a vulnerability like no other.

'I used to think that,' Angel agreed. 'I used to think that love was something that ... swallowed you whole, ripped you up inside.'

That was how it had been when he had realised he could no longer be with Buffy - and when he had first learned that she had moved on without him - and when he had learned of her death. Love with Buffy had gone hand in hand with pain and suffering. And now with Cordelia … watching the woman you loved wrapped up in blissful contentment with another man, an _inferior_ man - knowing that she lay in Doyle's arms, just a few floors below - and didn't spare a second thought for himself. His love for Cordelia could feel like a giant, sucking void in his chest sometimes.

But not with Connor.

'What I feel for Connor,' he explained to the watcher, 'even that fear. Wes, it's - it's not terrible.' He sighed - and looked down at his son - kicking his little legs in his crib. He smiled. 'It's beautiful.'

Wesley watched Angel watch his son. He glanced down and then looked back up again - a grin had spread across his face. Angel's love for Connor - it was stronger and deeper than anything the watcher had ever seen - had ever realised. Angel would protect his son, no matter what - no one watching him now could ever doubt such a thing - could ever believe that he would ever be a danger to the little boy. Wesley began to laugh.

Angel looked up at him, also smiling. 'What's so funny?' he asked, a little confused. He got up and went to check on the heating bottle.

'Life,' Wesley told him, 'life is funny,' he was still chuckling. 'Listening to stupid people talking to hamburgers is funny. Worrying about things that will never… It's all so incredibly funny and - and beautiful.'

Angel chuckled along with him, he took the bottle from the stove and began to dry it off. As he did so, there was a rumble - and then a second, harder earthquake hit the city. Pots and pans began to fall out of the cupboards.

* * *

Downstairs, Cordelia and Doyle pulled apart and then clung to the bed, as they felt the vibrations shake the building. The bedside cabinet began to inch its way down the room - as the motion of the quake picked it up and moved it along. Cordelia shrieked and grabbed hold of the lamp, which was just about to fall; holding it up, as the cabinet still rumbled away down the room. The wardrobe doors swung open - and clothes and weapons rained down onto the floor.

Doyle clung to the bedstead - and stared around at the destruction of his belongings.

* * *

Justine stood in the mansion - her legs were braced against the shaking. Holtz turned around as he felt the vibrations - and looked at her.

* * *

In her office, Lilah sat in her chair - and smirked, as she felt the building rattle around her. Things were moving on nicely. The plan was falling into place. She did enjoy a good portent.

* * *

In Angel's suite, the lit stove toppled over. A column of flame burst out - sending Angel flying across the room. Then a burning beam, from the ceiling, crashed down onto the ground between the vampire and Wesley.

* * *

Down in their room, Doyle and Cordy heard the small thump of the overturning stove - and then the much louder crash of the beam hitting the ground. 'What was that?' Cordelia asked, her eyes wide and frightened.

'I think it came from Angel's floor,' Doyle replied, his own eyes fixed on the ceiling. 'We better go check on him and Connor.' Unsteadily, the earth still shaking beneath their feet, they climbed off the bed and stumbled their way across the room and out to the staircases.

* * *

Holtz dove across the room and tackled Justine to the ground; forcing her down, just as a heavy shelf came crashing down right where she had been standing. She lay beneath him on the floor - and looked into his face - as he lay on top of her, shielding her with his own body.

* * *

Angel ran to the crib and gathered his son in his arms, along with the sky coloured blanket he had been lying on. 'Come on, kid,' he jumped over the burning beam and made his way to the door. But then he noticed Wesley just standing there - frozen - staring at the flames. 'Wesley get out!' he grabbed the watcher by the arm and forcibly yanked him from the room - throwing him over the threshold and out into the relatively clean air of the hallway. A moment later, a large chunk of ceiling fell down exactly where Wes had been standing.

Breathing heavily, Doyle and Cordy appeared at the top of the stairs, still only dressed in their bedclothes. 'Are you guys OK?' Doyle asked, when he saw them.

'Angel, you're cut,' Cordelia said - pointing to the deep gash on his forehead that was dripping blood.

'I'm fine,' he said, shaking off her fussing. Connor began to cry, 'it's OK, it's alright, it's alright,' the vampire soothed. As he looked down, the blood dripped from his cut and trickled on to Connor's blanket.

Wesley coughed, and pulled himself into a sitting position up against the wall. His eyes were glassy. 'Earthquake, fire, blood,' he rasped out.

'What?' Cordelia didn't understand.

But Doyle felt his stomach drop - as if he had just fallen down an elevator shaft - when he heard the watcher's words. He glanced at the fire, raging inside Angel's rooms - and then at the blood dripping from Angel's head. It landed on the blanket in a steady drip - staining it red, whereas before it had been light blue - with fluffy white clouds patterning it. The earth was shaking, the air was burning - and blood was staining the sky. The half demon felt a tightness in his chest that had nothing to do with the billowing smoke starving him of oxygen.

'I thought we were gonna be trapped in there,' Angel said to the others. Then he smiled, and looked down at Connor, 'still, at least I would have had something to snack on.'

Doyle and Wesley's eyes met across the hallway - and they just stared at each other, saying nothing.


	57. Sleep Tight: Part One

Wesley and Doyle were inside Wes' office, talking quietly. The door was opened - just a little - as they were supposed to be keeping an eye on Connor. The baby slept out in the lobby in his bassinet.

'We always knew the price of friendship with Angel,' Wesley said, 'we know what we have both sworn to do if he ever…'

'So you're sayin' we should kill him?'

'No,' the watcher's words came out as a deep sigh. 'But we both saw the signs … and the way Angel reacted - the things he said. We have to remove Connor from him - before…'

'Before it's too late... He won't let us take him away, you know.' Doyle thought about the vampire - and how he would react to being told that his son had to be taken from him for his own good.

'Not even if he knows it's for the best … knows it's the only way?' Wesley asked.

But Doyle shook his head. He didn't trust Angel to do what was for the best when he was so closely invested in the outcome. The vampire had proven - more than once - that he lacked judgement when it came to his emotions. He had fired his friends and given into his dark side when he had lost Darla. Fuelled by rage and grief, he had locked 15 humans in a wine cellar with his own vampire women and allowed them to be slaughtered - because he felt they had it coming. He had set Darla and Dru on fire - rather than just stake them. And when his path had finally ground him down into despair - he had slept with Darla in an attempt to lose his soul.

And this year - he was sniffing around Cordelia, looking to break her and Doyle up so he could have her for himself. He wasn't thinking about Cordelia's happiness - or even what he had to offer a human girl. All the problems that had ever existed with Buffy still existed with Cordelia. She would grow old and die - Angel never would. She would want a life - to go out in the sunshine, to go on vacation - Angel could never be there with her. And she would want a proper relationship - she would want sex - and Angel could never sleep with her for fear of losing his soul. She had all those things with Doyle - but the vampire was willing to take that from her just so he could have her for himself. And he was getting increasingly irritated and aggressive with Doyle, as he failed to get what he wanted.

So ... No - Doyle no longer trusted Angel to do the right thing - not if it was not what the vampire wanted for himself, anyway. Angel would not give up Connor. And because of his pigheadedness - he would end up killing his own son. It was down to Doyle and Wesley to save him from himself. Angel had always asked - demanded - that they do whatever it took, in the event of him turning evil. Well, this was what it was going to take … and if they were really Angel's friends, then they were going to have to do it.

'He'll never let us take Connor. He'll never believe the prophecy. We have to do this for him,' the Irishman said.

'You're right,' Wesley agreed, though he sounded unhappy. 'Do you want to take him? You and Cordelia - you could take him far away, be a family - where Angel would never find you.'

The half demon imagined that. For one glorious moment, he saw himself and Cordelia - and their son - living someone remote, where no one would find them. Maybe he could take his little family back home - get a place in the Wicklow mountains … all that space and air. And they could adopt more children - daughters - and he and Cordy could live a happy, normal life, raising a happy, normal family. Far away from demons and death and prophecies. He could go back to teaching … but then he shook his head, and the golden image vanished - like a bubble bursting.

'No,' he said, 'Cordelia would never … she would never let us do that. She wouldn't understand - she'd think we were betrayin' Angel. I don't think she has it in her to make a hard decision - like this - hurt someone she loves so badly for their own good.' He shook his head, 'she's too kind, too good, too honest.' The men exchanged a swift glance - the unspoken thought _'not like us'_ lay heavy on the air. Doyle sighed, 'She would never… It'll have to be you, man. I'm sorry.'

Wesley nodded, 'very well - I'll - I'll make - uh - the preparations.'

Outside, in the lobby, Connor began to cry. The two men looked at each other. 'You better get that,' Doyle said, 'you better get used to…'

The watcher left the office and went over to the bassinet. He stared down at the crying baby.

...

'Jeez Wesley,' Angel came up behind him, 'don't you know what you're supposed to do?' The vampire was drinking from a tall glass of blood. He set the glass on the counter and picked up his son. 'You pick em up when they fuss,' he told the watcher. 'Shh,' he jigged Connor up and down, 'daddy's here.'

Wesley stared at him - that thousand yard stare that had taken up residence on his face, ever since he first translated the prophecy. 'Sorry - I don't know what I was… I didn't sleep very well.'

'Yeah you look like hell,' Angel chuckled, 'and not the fun one where they burn you with hot pokers for all eternity - the hard core one, with Richard Nixon and Britney Spears.'

'You're awfully chipper today.'

Angel agreed he was - and he knew it was weird - what with the earthquake and the fire, he had hardly slept. But he still had loads of energy.

Doyle emerged from Wes' office, and stood in the doorway listening in. He glanced up when he heard a noise on the stair - Cordelia was coming down, yawning. Unlike Angel, the earthquake and fire had left her wiped out - and she had had a slow start to the day. She kissed Doyle good morning and went to pour herself a cup of coffee.

Angel picked up his glass of blood, 'God - I could drink a horse!' he announced.

Cordelia frowned, as she returned to the group, coffee in hand. 'You know we're nearly out of pig's blood,' she said, 'it really isn't that long since I last put an order in with the butcher.'

Angel took another long gulp, 'put in another order, today,' he snuggled his son closer, 'I don't know what I'll eat if I run out of pig's blood - no I don't - but I'm so hungry I don't wanna find out.' He chuckled again, and kissed Connor's head.

Wesley's blue eyes met Doyle's green ones. Doyle nodded.

'Speaking of the earthquake,' Wesley said, looking away from his co-conspirator and instead turning to Angel, 'you do realise we have no insurance?'

'Yeah - bummer.'

'Your room is..'

'The wreck of the Hesperus,' Angel interrupted. 'I know - Wes - don't be such a worry wart. The best part of owning a hotel is plenty of rooms. I'll just move to another room until we get mine fixed.' He heard the strum of a guitar come from outside in the courtyard, and a melodious voice floated through the air, 'who is that singing?' He wandered off to look.

...

'Well, he sure is taking this well,' Cordelia said, quirking an eyebrow, 'maybe Mr. doom and gloom crabby scowl should have his home destroyed every day - he'd be wearing colour by the end of the week!'

'He's not himself,' Doyle told her. 'It can't be good.'

...

Angel stood in the doorway, holding Connor, and drinking his glass of blood. Outside, Lorne was sat on the bench with a young woman - the owner of the guitar and the pretty voice. She stopped singing - and asked Lorne what he could see. He could see she was scared - and asked her to continue. She sang again.

Connor began to fuss - and Angel took him inside to go and look at his weapons, 'wanna see something cool?' He opened up the cabinet, 'you like the broadsword? This is your old man's favourite.' He suddenly turned to the others, 'hey - he's gonna be crawling in no time - we need to baby proof this place.' He absentmindedly handed the baby to Wesley, as he considered options for baby proofing his weapons. Connor began to grisel, 'It's OK,' Angel told him, 'it's your Uncle Wes. He loves you bunches. He's just … English.'

...

'Are you kidding? It's the best state in the union!' Fred came downstairs - talking on her cell. She frowned, 'well, what's wrong with Texas?... Texas doesn't hate the black man. Texas loves the black man. What's so great about California?'

The front door opened and Gunn walked in, also talking on his cell, 'we got the weather, the ocean…'

'The earth that opens up and swallows you whole,' Fred reminded him - walking towards him - still on her cell.

'The lakers, the music.'

'The traffic, the smog.'

They were face to face to face now. 'It's got you,' Gunn said.

She grinned and closed he phone up. 'OK - you win.'

...

Wesley looked over at them - still holding Connor, rather awkwardly. 'Good to see you're using the company phones to make such important calls,' he said drily. Cordy and Doyle glanced at each other, uncomfortably, as Fred and Gun looked abashed.

'Chain em up!' Angel said loudly, Fred looked alarmed… but he was talking about his weapons. 'I say we put a chain and combination lock on the cabinet - better safe than sorry.' He took Connor back off Wesley, 'isn't that right, buddy?' he said kissing the baby - then he smiled at Wes, 'he likes you, I can tell.'

Wesley and Doyle exchanged another glance, and then the watcher cleared his throat. 'I like him too,' he told the enthusiastic father. 'As a matter of fact I was thinking I'd take him to the park, or the beach - just the two of us.'

Doyle coughed and looked away - but Wesley continued to talk, 'maybe there'll be time in the next day or two.'

'Sounds great,' Angel smiled, 'yeah - count on it.' Cordelia smiled along with him - that sounded nice, Wesley bonding with the baby … now if she could only convince Doyle to do the same. She didn't notice that neither her boyfriend or Wesley seemed to be getting any pleasure out of this suggested bonding session between the watcher and Connor - despite it being Wes' idea.

...

'Uh - guys,' Lorne had popped his head around the door, 'I think you should come and look at this.' They all followed him outside into the courtyard - Angel hanging back in the shadows, with Connor - and the green demon introduced the woman to them all as Kim. Then he told Kim not to worry - the team were professionals - and told her to sing once again.

' _My heart is breaking in two - no love, no light left. no you …'_

Her face suddenly morphed into a grey skinned, pop eyed scaly demon. ' _I'll hack your eyeballs out and rip your children in two,'_ she yelled. Green, viscous drool began to drip from her mouth - and then she shrank back into her human form and began to shake.

'Catchy finish, huh?' Lorne said to the others.

* * *

They took Kim back inside, and made her some tea to soothe her. Lorne explained how he knew her - she had sung for him and he had put her on her true path a couple of years ago. She had been in medical school - but Lorne had known she was meant to be a singer.

Gunn raised an eyebrow, 'yeah - who needs more doctors in the world when you can have singing demons.'

'Well - the demon part is new,' Kim told him.

'Ha! Singing demons, flying nuns - good one, G!' Angel took another sip of his blood. Gunn stared at him for a moment, and then shook his head and returned his focus to the conversation.

Kim had hooked up with a band a couple of weeks ago. They had seemed the really mellow type - never took drugs - or played a diminished chord.

Angel, however, was not focusing on her tale. 'I like nuns,' he mused, 'how did the flying nun fly, anyway? I mean was it God - or magic?' Everyone stared at the vampire, like he was nuts. He stared back, 'what? You think about these things, sometimes.' Everyone stared some more - he sighed and spoke to Kim, 'please continue.'

She told them how the band members had started changing. One had grown a seventh finger overnight - he had already had six - and the other had sprouted a spiny thing on his back. She had thought - well she didn't know what she had thought. But then it had happened to her. She looked at the team, fearfully, 'is that going to happen to me? Am I gonna turn into that?'

'Hey - I know turning into a demon can be scary,' Doyle said to her kindly.

'How can you possibly..?'

'Been there - done that - bought the t-shirt,' he said, 'but,' he looked up at the others, 'this doesn't sound at all like what happened to me - if this is affecting all of them?'

'Plus - you're still you when you're a demon,' Cordelia pointed out, 'what we just saw - that was more like a possession or something.'

'It's an infection,' Wesley said. He and Fred were working at the desk, examining the traces of green drool under the microscope. 'It isn't permanent.'

'You can clear it right up by taking cylenthium powder,' Fred told her, 'I think 20 milligrams twice a day for a month should cover it.'

Kim looked confused, 'cylenthium powder - what's…?'

'Mystical antibiotic,' Lorne told her, 'I'll get you some.'

'My guy in Koreatown can fix you up with a good price,' Doyle offered.

'So what about the other band members?' Cordelia asked, 'what's their story - are they infected too or…'

Fred held up the glass slide she had been examining. The saliva had shown traces of penloxia. Neither Kim, nor Cordy, nor Doyle, nor Gunn looked any the wiser. But Lorne nodded in realisation. 'They're wraith-ers,' he said.

'Demons that can make themselves look human for a length of time,' Wesley clarified, 'ten days, two weeks … then they revert back to what they really are.' He picked up one of his hefty ancient tomes, and showed a picture to Kim. The demon in the illustration was grey of skin, with spines down it's back and too many fingers on each hand.

'So why they wanna look like musicians?' Gunn asked.

'To get the chicks! Musicians get the chicks!' Everyone turned and stared at the exuberant vampire, again. He looked disbelieving, 'what, they gonna look like dentists? Let's take 'em out! Where are they?'

Kim told them where they could find the wraith-ers that had been her bandmates - they had a rehearsal space in Echo Park.

'So what do we do?' Cordelia asked.

'You'll have to kill them,' Wesley said, 'it's the only thing you can do with wraith-ers. If Lorne stays to take care of the baby - and the rest of you go - I have some business to attend to.'

They all nodded, and got to their feet, 'are we sure we're up to this?' Doyle asked, 'those wraith-ers - they look pretty scary.'

'Piece of cake!' Angel told him. He moved onto the balls of his feet and raised his fist - shadow boxing the half demon, Doyle just stared at him - half way between annoyed and unnerved. 'I'm up for a little kick ass!' the vampire cried, 'who's with me?'

Cordelia shook her head, as she helped herself to a large weapon, 'what is with him?' she muttered.

* * *

Holtz' fighters trained against the vampires they had captured and chained up. Justine was leading them - teaching them how to fight. 'You have to feel where your fellow soldiers are,' she told them, 'you can trust each other with your lives.' She wrapped the chain around the vampire's neck - and kicked it to the ground. 'Keep practising,' she said to the others - and went to join Holtz.

'I don't like it,' he said to her.

She glanced over her shoulder at the training session, 'they'll learn - or they'll die.'

'Oh, not that,' he corrected, 'they're coming along nicely. I don't like tea in these cotton cups.'

She smiled, 'it's called Styrofoam,' she told him, 'I'll get you some china ones.'

'Thank you, Justine - are you ready?'

She said she was - but there was hesitation in her voice. It was the people who worked with Angel, she told Holtz, they may end up killing some of them - it worried her.

'We may end up killing all of them,' he replied.

She sighed - she was willing to follow Holtz through the gate of hell itself to kill vampires, there was no question of that. Holtz looked at her sternly, 'but people - even evil people who choose to work with a vampire…' unseen, he picked up a knife and held it concealed in his hand, 'are a different kettle of fish.'

She looked at him for a moment, and then shook her head. 'They chose Angel, that makes them enemy soldiers.'

'So I guess that makes it alright then,' Wesley's voice cut into the conversation - and Justine whirled around to see the watcher standing there in the attic room.

'What the hell do you want?' she snarled.

'Don't be rude, Justine,' Holtz admonished, 'Mr. Wyndam Pryce is our guest … and in the throws of a very difficult decision, I would imagine.' He used the knife to cut a slice of apple, and offered it to Wesley. 'You want some apple?'

* * *

Gunn picked up a trashcan - hauled back - and then chucked it through the window with all his strength. The garbage can smashed through the glass and bounced onto the floor - and the street fighter climbed through the hole, carrying a crossbow. He was followed by Fred, Cordelia and Doyle - and lastly Angel - carrying a blanket over his head so that he didn't burst into flames.

The band stopped playing - and looked angrily at the team of demon hunters. 'Dude, you're paying for that window.'

'Are you the A and R guys - because this isn't the whole band … we got this killer chick that sings...'

'We're not the A and R guys,' Angel told them, 'we're here to kill you.'

The drummer leapt off the stage. Gunn hit him and sent him flying backwards. The four living members of the team all raised their weapons and faced down the three wraith-ers who were squaring off with them. But then the demons came to a dead halt. 'Ah - come on - take it like a demon,' Gunn taunted. But then he heard the snarling. He glanced over his shoulder - and saw Angel in full vamp face - growling at the wraith-ers.

'Angel, man…' Doyle started to say, uncertainly, 'what…?'

But he was cut off, as Angel leapt over them and tackled all three at once. He launched a furious assault on each demon - hitting and kicking and whaling on them. The team members all began to edge backwards - as the fray got messier and more violent - as the vampire tore into the demons - and ripped them apart.

Doyle just stared at Angel - at his vampiric face - and the murder in his eyes. The vampire continued to pound on the demons - pulverising them into little pieces - and Doyle knew he and Wesley were right. They had to get Connor away from this creature - this _thing_.

The last of the wraith-ers died, with a pained scream - and Angel tossed its body away. He turned to face his friends, still in vamp face, a dismembered arm in his hands, 'well that was fun.'

* * *

'I don't want to see anyone get hurt,' Wesley told Holtz, 'your soldiers or mine.'

Holtz nodded. He also hated violence - though he had seen a lot of it in his life. Not as much as Angelus had though, he would wager.

'Angel,' Wesley corrected.

'Whatever you wish to call him,' the vampire hunter shrugged, 'I will never agree that he has somehow been absolved from the past by the presence of his soul.'

'He's a vampire,' Justine said, 'end of discussion.' - She raised a knife to threaten Wesley, stepping closer to him, 'and I bet this one is here to stab us in the back.'

'Who did you lose?' Wesley asked her.

That threw her off her game. She looked disconcerted. 'What?'

'You're here in Holtz' army - ready to die for the cause. You must have lost someone very important to you.'

'That's none of your business.'

'Her twin sister, Julia, was murdered by vampires,' Holtz told him.

Wesley looked at her with pity in his eyes. She had lost family - he was sorry - he truly was. But Angel and the team were his family - and when he said he didn't want to see anyone get hurt … he grabbed Justine's knife and then twisted her around, so he was holding her with the knife to her throat … he mostly meant them. 'But I don't stab people in the back,' he told her.

'You're an honest man,' Holtz said, as Wesley let Justine go, 'I trust you … and you can trust me.'

'That's funny - I don't.'

Holtz sat down and eyed the watcher. He wasn't Wesley's problem right now. Wesley's problem was that Angel was going to murder his own child - and the British man wanted to stop that - had to do something about it. 'You know if you don't, I will,' he said. He wasn't going to stand back and watch an innocent child get murdered. Nor would he attack and endanger other innocent lives - unless he was forced to.

'How long do I have?' Wesley asked.

'One day,' Holtz replied. 'After that - everyone gets hurt.'


	58. Sleep Tight: Part Two

The team arrived back at the hotel - where Lorne was playing with Connor and his stuffed animals. 'So how'd it go?' the green demon asked.

'The wraith-ers are no more,' Gunn told him.

'Tore 'em apart,' Angel said.

'Literally,' Fred added - frowning.

Doyle slumped down on the round sofa. Cordelia sat beside him and wrapped her arms around him, 'you OK?' she asked, 'you've been quiet ever since…'

'Since Angel performed the Texas chainsaw massacre without the pesky chainsaw?'

'Well - yeah.'

'Just .. regrettin' havin' my breakfast first, I guess.' He narrowed his eyes, as Angel ignored his son in favour of going to the fridge and taking out another glass of blood.

'He has been as good as gold whilst his daddy's been gone,' Lorne was saying - Angel began to glug, noisily. 'Do you miss your daddy?' Lorne said to Connor - cuddling him, 'well he's right here - hey, Angel - I think Connor needs some Papa love.'

'He needs a lot of things - all day everyday.'

'Yeah - that's how kids are,' the anagogic demon sounded worried.

Cordelia got to her feet, leaving Doyle behind, and went over to the vampire. 'Angel -' but she was cut off.

'Connor needs a bath, Connor needs a bottle,' he made his voice a parody of a whine - and then switched to anger. 'What Connor needs is to grow up!' Everyone stared at him in shock - but he just continued to drink his blood.

'Is something wrong?' Lorne asked.

'Gosh, no, Lorne - everything's _great_!' Connor began to cry at the shouting - and Angel glared daggers at him, 'I got a kid that cries, pees and moans and never gives me a moment to myself!'

'Angel - parenthood is…'

'What do you know about parenthood, Cordy?' Angel snapped, 'you don't have a baby. You can walk away from my kid whenever you want - me? I'm trapped!'

Doyle pushed himself up on the sofa, so he was leaning forward. His eyes were narrowed and his brow was furrowed, and he never stopped watching the irate vampire. But he didn't say anything. Cordelia just stood there - with her mouth open - looking offended.

Connor began to wail in earnest, and Lorne shushed him - reassuring him that everything was OK.

'No it's not OK,' Angel barked, 'shut up, Connor.'

'Don't yell at him - he's just a baby!' Fred sounded outraged.

'He keeps it up - he's not gonna be a baby for long!'

Doyle's eyebrows shot to the top of his forehead. The vampire hauled back and threw his glass as hard as he could against the wall. The glass smashed and fell to the floor in fragments. The blood dripped down the wall.

'You gotta get a grip on yourself right now,' Gunn said firmly.

Angel was staring at the wall - watching the blood slowly trickle downwards. He turned around and stared at his friends. 'What's wrong with me?' he asked.

...

The seconds of silence lengthened, as everyone stared at each other - and at the blood still sliding down the walls. The shock was almost tangible; the quiet was becoming more and more uncomfortable, as no one knew how to break it. It was into this suffocating atmosphere of hush that the sound of Doyle's cell ringing, loudly, cut through - harsh and shrill - disturbing the stillness. It made the half demon jump, and he quickly fumbled in his jacket pocket and dug it out. It was Wesley. 'I - uh - I gotta take this - sorry,' he got to his feet and hurried out of the front door - only answering the call when it had closed behind him.

...

'Something's not right,' Angel said - shaken from his horrified reverie by Doyle's hasty departure.

'You could say that,' Gunn agreed.

Lorne glanced between the smashed glass on the floor and the vampire who had thrown it, he was frowning. 'I can't help but notice - when did you start drinking so much blood?'

'I don't know … A few days ago.'

Cordelia nodded, 'I said earlier this morning - we we're nearly out of pig's blood already.' She did some quick calculations in her head, 'you normally drink what - just over half a gallon a day? You must have drunk nearly 10 gallons in the past week - that's way too much.'

'I've just been so hungry.'

'Where did you get it?' Fred asked.

'Same butcher as always - right Cordy?'

The business manager nodded again. 'Belcampo butchers shop in Downtown - it's the one we've used since we first opened the business - back in our old offices. They don't ask questions.'

'And it's always pig's blood,' Angel added, 'only the last batch,' he shook his head as he considered the blood he had been drinking recently, 'it just seemed so much more…'

'What?' asked Gunn

'Tasty.'

They all looked concerned. 'How was it more tasty?' Cordelia asked, 'what was different?'

'It was sweeter - I guess? Just - better - than normal.'

'And you didn't think to say anything?'

'I guess - I thought - I dunno - that after all this time I was finally getting used to pig's blood. Forgetting what human blood tastes like.'

'And is that how it tasted?' Cordelia's voice was sharp, now, 'did it taste human? You've been acting strange of late - is this why?'

'Lady's right,' Gunn said, 'you better believe it, you were all hyped this morning. Then you went all Tyson on those demons. Then you kinda crashed. But you had another glass of blood, and that's when you started throwing things.'

'Just like my Aunt Viola and her Southern Comfort,' Fred agreed.

'So - the question is,' Lorne said slowly, 'has someone been spiking your drink?' They all stared again at the blood stained wall.

'Let's find out,' Fred said.

* * *

'Yes I need to speak with you right away,' Wesley said into the phone, 'meet me at the bar, right away, so we can talk freely.'

He hung up and continued walking down the street. A little girl - pre school in age - came running out of her house, 'daddy!' she cried. Her father got out of his car, picked her up and carried her back inside - hugging her tight the whole way. Their front door closed behind them - and Wesley walked on. Would that be him, soon? He wondered. Would the bitter taste of the betrayal, of the man he owed everything to, ever fade enough that he could just enjoy fatherhood - that he could just be Connor's father - without glancing over his shoulder the whole time, waiting for Angel to find them - and deal with him?

His head hung low and his pace was slow, as he walked. His feet - and his heart - felt heavy. What he was about to do, he did not do lightly, and the prospect brought him no joy. But it was his duty to do the right thing by the innocent people he was sworn to protect - no matter how difficult - how unpalatable. That was one of the first lessons at the watcher's academy - a watcher must be willing to do what others can't… shouldn't have to. He had been trained rigorously for trials just like this - perhaps this was his purpose in the universe. His very reason for being. The only person with iron will enough to steal their friend's child and protect him; allow the miracle boy to grow to manhood. If Wesley could not do this - then Connor was fated to die - and Wesley would be every bit the failure his father had ever accused him of being.

He came to a halt. 'Oh for god's sake,' he said quietly, then he raised his voice - but did not look around. 'I know you're better at following people than this.'

Justine stepped out from behind the tree line - and now Wesley turned to look at her. 'So, what's the play?'

She looked uncomfortable, and took a step closer to him. 'I just… need to talk to you. I'm alone. He doesn't know that I'm … I wanna talk to you about him.'

'Holtz? Great guy - not overly tall,' he began to walk away, continuing down the path, 'is this the part where you offer to help me behind his back?'

Justine hurried after him, 'do you believe in anything? Or is this all just a big scam to you?' she asked.

'You're a soldier,' Wesley told her, not slowing his pace, 'the fight to the death kind. I respect that. You work for a man you believe is noble and good. I respect that. The trouble is he is neither.'

'You work for a vampire.'

'Who in fact _is_ noble and good. Quirky, but there it is. Holtz talks about justice, and it's stirring, but what he wants is revenge. He's driven for it, blinded by it - and if you, me, or anyone else gets in the way - he'll kill for it.'

Justine disagreed. Wesley didn't know Holtz - what he had done for her, for all his fighters.

'Sounds like a nice little cult.'

'He gave you his word,' she told him, 'he'll keep it - it's you that is blind… What you're about to do to your friend? I imagine it's easier to hate Holtz than yourself.'

Wesley stopped - and hung his head as he considered her words for a moment. 'There's enough to go around for both him and me. Be careful.' And with that final warning, he left her standing on the sidewalk and walked away.

She watched him go - and then turned to make her way back to the mansion.

'You're being careful,' Holtz' voice, out of nowhere, made her jump - and she saw him come out from the treeline. 'I didn't even hear you leave.'

* * *

Angel paced up and down, as Fred examined the specimen of blood under the microscope. 'We were right,' she said, 'there's more to the pig's blood than meets the eye - just a trace of…'

'Human blood,' Angel said, 'Connor's.'

'How do you know that?' Gunn asked.

'Because the last couple of days he's…' he inhaled sharply - a deep oxygenless breath, as he got ready to confess, and wrapped his arms around himself, 'he's smelled like food.'

' _Excuse me?'_ Cordelia sounded scandalised, and she looked up from the sofa, where she sat cradling the sleeping Connor. She pulled him closer against herself, as if to offer a modicum of protection. 'And you didn't mention that to anyone _because...?_ '

'How could I?' Angel looked shamefaced, 'it didn't happen - _bam_ \- it was gradual… and I didn't wanna admit... What would you all think of me?'

'That someone was spiking your blood, dumbass,' Cordy told him, her eyebrow arched and pointed, 'and then we would have sorted it - before the bloody shredding of the wraith-ers and redecoration of the lobby in paint de pig's blood.'

'I guess,' he mumbled, 'I'm sorry.'

'Well I suppose there was no real harm done,' she admitted, grumbling.

'So,' said Lorne, 'they've been feeding you your own son's blood so you'd get the taste of it and want more.'

'Who's they?' asked Fred, looking up from her microscope - not yet fully understanding.

'Who do you think?' said Angel.

'Now it's time for the _real_ harm to be done,' Cordelia smirked.

* * *

'Holtz has given me one day to get Connor out of the hotel - one day - and then he is going to raid the Hyperion and kill everyone in there.'

'I think he might be over estimatin' his abilities there, bud - we faced a lot scarier things than a human vampire hunter and his ragtag bunch of loony followers.'

'True,' Wesley took a sip of his pint, 'but they are willing to fight to kill - and we would not wish to kill any of them. It puts us at a disadvantage. And even if we do all manage to come through unscathed, it means we will have had to incapacitate a large number of humans - who in any other circumstances would be fighting on our side. Connor has to be taken, we may as well do it now … and avoid an unnecessary bloodbath.'

'I guess you're right,' Doyle sounded glum, 'I hoped … I hoped there would be more time, but…' he sighed, 'maybe it's for the best - we saw the portents, we know it's close and Angel, man, Angel's changin'. You should have seen him against those wraith-ers.'

Wesley frowned, 'what happened?'

'He just - he ripped them to pieces - I mean literally - he whaled on them - without stoppin'. It was like - you remember ages ago - the thrall demon we had to kill in the water tank? And we were all gettin' attacked by it's disciples … and Angel was just beatin' on this one guy - non-stop - even after Gunn had killed the demon?'

Wesley nodded - he remembered.

'Well - I guess it was a bit like that. At least - that's the closest thing I can come up with for comparison.'

'He was having those dreams about Darla then,' Wesley remembered, 'under her malign influence - it was part of the path to turning dark - if he is in a similar state now…'

'Oh it's similar,' Doyle assured him, 'when we got back he just - wigged out - yellin' at Connor. He threw a glass of blood at the wall, said if Connor didn't stop cryin' then he wouldn't be a baby for long.'

'He made a death threat against his own son?' Wesley leaned back on his seat, looking alarmed, 'then things are worse than we feared.'

'I guess,' Doyle took a sip of his own pint, 'so, you're gonna take him tonight?'

'Yes - this evening - I'll take him straight out of Los Angeles.'

'Where will you go?'

'Away - I'm not sure. I'll aim to get over the state line tonight. Plan things further once there is some distance between…'

'You gonna go home? Back to England?'

Wesley glanced around the pub - the pictures of the queen and the famous London landmarks and the decorative flags. The Spice Girls were blaring out - their cheerful pop music oddly incongruent with the darkness of their conversation. 'Maybe,' he said - home might be nice after all these years in the constant sunshine. 'It would have to be somewhere Angel wouldn't think to look and England … the entire British Isles - they're not that big.'

'And the general overcast gloom of the weather makes it an easier place for vampires to move around during the day,' Doyle nodded. 'Well, the world is wide, Wesley - you'll find somewhere.'

'I will.'

'You will - you will ring me - when you've found your place, man?' The Irishman asked, 'let me know you're both OK - give me a contact number for in case … well in case we ever need to reach you for some reason.'

'Do you think that wise?' Wesley asked, 'would it not be better if I just disappear - so no one can find me?'

'It might not be wise,' Doyle replied, 'but I wanna know you're OK - and I guess I owe it to Angel to make sure that Connor is OK. No one will know I know how to contact y' … no one'll have reason to suspect. But one day - havin' stayed in contact might turn out to be a blessin'.'

'Very well - I shall ring you once we've found somewhere permanent to settle - or at least somewhere that will do for the time being.'

'Thanks.' He sighed deeply, 'it isn't gonna be the same without you around. I don't know what we'll do. I'm gonna miss you, man.'

'Same here,' Wesley looked genuinely touched by Doyle's admission, 'but it has to happen.'

'Is there anything I can do to help?'

Wesley cleared his throat, and thought carefully, 'there are some preparations I need to make,' he said. 'I want to get some cash out - empty my account - pack, there's some items I wish to pick up from the magic shop in Koreatown - and a book … and then I'll take Connor later this evening.'

Doyle nodded, 'I'll clear everyone out of the hotel for y' … give you a clear get away.'

'Thanks - I know I've already said it, but I am glad I've had you to talk this over with, to help me. This would have been much harder to face alone. You are a true brother, Doyle.'

Doyle smiled, 'same here.'

* * *

Lilah sat at the bar and ordered herself a drink. She looked at herself in the mirror that took up the opposite wall - and then suddenly flexed her hand out like a feline claw, and hissed. 'Like a cat,' she said. 'I can't hear you, but I'm starting to be able to sense when you're near.'

'And Cordelia's reflection was in no way a giveaway as to my presence,' Angel said.

Lilah turned on her bar stool to face him. She smiled, 'oh honey, I don't pay attention to your sidekicks. Not anymore. So, how did you find me?'

'Your assistant.'

'I'll have his arms broken.'

'Already taken care of.'

She laughed, and nodded her head, slightly - taking in his words, 'and I'm next?' Angel and Cordelia exchanged a look. Cordelia's face certainly seemed to suggest that she would quite enjoy watching Lilah get her limbs ripped off like a bug. But Angel wasn't in the mood - he ordered himself a drink, whisky straight - and then asked Cordelia what she wanted.

'We're having drinks?' the young woman sounded outraged, 'Mrs Evil 2002 spikes your blood with Connor's blood and you're just gonna sit there and drink with her? What are you doing? Torture her!'

'You know - I could,' Angel said, taking his drink from the bartender - and telling him Lilah was paying, 'but where will it get me?'

'It will make you feel better,' Cordelia said, 'and remind her not to mess with us again.'

'Right,' Angel said, nodding, 'because that'll work, Cordelia - we always threaten and she always comes back for more.'

'Well then maybe it's time we just cut our losses and killed her? Angel, she tried to get you to kill your own son - aren't there some things that are just … I dunno - unforgivable? A line someone can cross from which there is no going back?'

'If there is - I crossed that line 250 years ago,' the vampire replied.

'Oh this is so _not_ the same - you want redemption - she doesn't! She's, like, the Queen of Wolfram and Hart.'

'I do what I have to,' Lilah smirked, 'Cordelia - have a drink - you're over 21 now aren't you, sweet pea?'

'Cordy - have a drink - we're chatting, here.' Angel said. The young woman grumbled as she sat down, and ordered herself a margarita.

'So - why did you want me to kill my own son?' Angel asked - almost conversationally.

'I just like messing with you guys - and since Doyle and I buried the hatchet - well, a girl's gotta keep herself busy somehow.' She raised an eyebrow, 'where is short, dark, and chest hair anyway? … You haven't ditched the demon love of your life for the dark avenger, now have you, Cordy?'

Cordelia looked surprised, 'what? No… he's just … elsewhere. Why would you think I'd ditch him?'

Lilah smirked again, 'I saw some interesting things on those tapes Gavin had made … I watched the two of you grow ever closer - saw you training, holding hands - and the half breed watching it _all,_ silently, never saying a word.'

Cordelia and Angel exchanged an uncomfortable look.

'And now here you are - with Angel - acting as his backup - whilst Doyle is… where did you say he was again? Oh yeah … _elsewhere._ Why did you come here, Cordelia?'

'Angel needs me. I'm his support. I'm here to remind him who to torture - and who to drink with.'

'Is that right? Because, you know, I found out Doyle's big secret,' the lawyer said, her smile becoming broader and more malignant. 'Seems to me Angel now has the one thing that Doyle can never give you - and here you are with him, protecting him - instead of ... _elsewhere.'_

Angel looked between them - looking confused - Cordelia had gone pale with outrage. 'What's Doyle's big secret?' he asked, 'what do I have that he can't have?'

But he never got his answer. 'You backstabbing, traitorous bitch!' a voice hissed. The three of them turned around, just as Sahjahn materialised into the bar. 'I have a lot of work to do. I can't be in every time/space at once. And here you are, drinking with my sworn enemy?'

Angel looked even more confused, 'sworn enemy? Really? Have we met? Because I don't remember swearing.'

'Who is this guy?' Cordelia asked.

'This is Sahjahn,' Lilah told them, 'Sahjahn - this is a mistake. Angel found _me_.'

The vampire looked between the demon and the lawyer, 'so you two are all in cahoots. Ethereal time travelling demon. Hey - you must be the guy that brought Holtz back. How's that working out for you? He doesn't really like demons.'

'You will learn nothing from me,' Sahjahn snarled.

Lilah laughed, drily, 'other than that you're his sworn enemy who brought Holtz back and when that didn't work you came to me. Idiot.'

'You want me to make some notes?' Cordelia asked, 'this guy is singing like a canary.'

'Thanks - but I think I can remember all this.'

'Hey - you think my life is easy?' Sajhan demanded, 'jumping around from dimension to dimension. I don't always have sound. Sometimes it's just a visual. I saw you two sitting here … with this lovely young lady,' he waved an arm to indicate Cordy, 'getting all chummy. I formed conclusions.'

'So why do you wanna kill me?' Angel asked, he was sounding pretty amused. He had come to this bar looking for blood vengeance, only to find he had no taste for it - and gone with whisky instead. And now a demon, whose sense of melodrama made Angel look positively restrained, was spilling out all his secrets plans. This had turned out to be a pretty good evening. He was glad Cordy had come along to share in it.

'You probably pissed him off somewhere along the line,' Cordelia said, 'you're pretty good at that.'

'It's the one thing he wouldn't tell me,' Lilah said to them. 'Maybe you boinked his demon bride or ate his mother.'

'They do sound like things you might do, Angel.'

'Do you really not know who he is?' Lilah asked the vampire, looking between him and Sahjahn.

'You will pay!' Sahjahn snarled.

'For what?' Angel chuckled. But the demon only melted into thin air.

Lilah raised an eyebrow, 'well - whatever his grudge is - I think you only made him madder.'


	59. Sleep Tight: Part Three

'Guys?' why don't you go get somethin' to eat?' Doyle glanced down at his watch - it was nearly time for Wesley to come and get Connor, he needed to clear the hotel out. 'It's gettin' late - Fred you must be hungry?'

'Well,' she giggled, 'I didn't want to say nothin'...'

Doyle smiled, 'go on, love - you and Gunn go get dinner.'

'Alright - you want me to bring you somethin' back?'

'Yeah - I got a real hankerin' for a hoagie - you know the ones they sell on that little cart down on fifth?' He was going to send her well away - to give Wesley plenty of time to get in and out unheeded.

'Sure - I can do that,' she smiled again, and grabbed her jacket. 'Charles!' she called, 'we're goin' out for dinner.'

Gunn appeared at her side, almost instantly, 'sounds like a plan .. where we headed?'

'The hoagie stand on fifth.'

'I'm in.'

Doyle watched them leave - holding his breath until the door shut behind them. Now it was time to get rid of Lorne… Thank God Angel and Cordy were still out - wherever they were. He didn't even have time or space to be jealous, tonight, he was just glad he didn't have to distract them.

He found the demon fixing himself a drink in Wes' office. 'Hey, Lorne - you know - you've been looking after Connor all day - and y' had that client this mornin' … why don't you give yourself a break? Go do somethin' fun.'

'Well - I am technically on babysitting duty..'

'Hey - I can do that for y' - piece o' cake. Besides I'm sure Angel won't be long.'

'You know ... there is a Liza Minelli tribute act on tonight that I've been dying to see. Skarlof demon - hump backed and the face of a pig - but boy does that thing have a voice that can move you to tears… he used to perform at Caritas sometimes.'

'Well … that sounds great … go watch a Skarlof demon sing "Cabaret" - could be a life changer.'

'You're sure you're OK with Connor?'

'Sure I am - get goin'!' He fixed his widest smile on his face.

'Bless you little fella - I was going kinda stir crazy with all the games of peekaboo - may the gods of your people smile down on you.'

'Ah - my people only have the one god - big fella - big into dictatin' rules about sex… I'd rather he didn't look at me at all, if I'm honest.'

Lorne laughed, as he picked up his hat and put it on to hide his horns. 'Sounds just like Pylea … well - toodles.' He waved, waggling his fingers, and then headed for the door. Doyle watched him go - his false smile fixed firmly in place, until the door closed. Then it slid from his face and he breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

He crossed over to the bassinet - and peered in at the baby. 'Well I guess this is gonna be goodbye, kiddo,' he said - he took a deep breath. 'I'm sorry I wasn't nicer to y', OK? I'm sorry I wasn't the dotin' Uncle Francis I was supposed to be - that Angel expected me to be. But .. you just came outta nowhere, kid, you know that? And - well - it was just too much.' He reached out and tweaked Connor's toes, as the baby kicked his tiny foot.

'I can't … I only just found out that I can't have children, y'see and … and I wasn't ready for there to be a baby in the house. So I tried to keep myself away from y'. And I tried to keep your Aunty Cordy away from y', as well - and that was wrong. Because I think, given the chance, she would have really loved you. But maybe it's all turned out for the best - because now you have to go away - so it's better me and Cordy never got too close to y' … 'cause now we're gonna have to be there for your dad, when he realises you're gone. There won't be time for us to grieve.'

He took another deep breath. 'I never wanted y' here,' he admitted, 'but I want you to know - I'm not gettin' rid of you because I'm jealous or angry - with you or Angel. I could've learned to live with y'. I'm doin' this to protect you - and Angel - from the demon he's gonna become. I just … I just wanted to tell y' that … even though you can't understand a word I'm sayin'.'

The door opened - and he looked up in alarm. But it was Wesley. Their eyes met across the lobby - and they just looked at each other for a moment - heavy with the knowledge of what had to be done. 'Did you get everything?' Doyle asked.

'Yes - everything's ready - I just need the Greek commentary on the Nyazian scroll - I intend to continue studying it. It's in my office.'

'I'll get it,' Doyle offered, 'you pack up Connor's stuff.' He headed into the office - the door swung closed behind him.

...

As Doyle left the lobby, Lorne re-entered it. 'Would you believe - I left my wallet?' he grinned, 'been so long since I had a night out on the tiles I don't even know what to do anymore. Hey Wes.'

'Lorne,' the watcher nodded a greeting and - holding his nerve - picked up the baby.

'What are you doing?' the anagogic demon said, smiling, as he noticed the diaper bag slung over the Englishman's shoulder.

'Oh - I'm taking him to stay at mine for the night,' Wes improvised - remembering the lie he had told Angel that morning. 'I'm taking him to the park in the morning.'

'That's nice - hey, don't forget his teddy,' Lorne picked up one of the stuffed animals from the bassinet and handed it to Wesley, 'it's his favourite.'

'Thank you.'

Connor began to fuss, and Wesley jigged him up and down to soothe him, 'c'mon it's your Uncle Wesley,' he said, 'you like your Uncle Wesley.'

'This is my cue to head on out - I'm free of baby sitting duty tonight - hallelujah!' the green demon began to make his way towards the door. The baby continued to grisel, and - having had no luck talking to him - Wesley began to hum. Then he stopped and straightened up. He turned around - and saw Lorne, frozen by the door staring at him. He quickly dropped the baby back in the bassinet.

Lorne backed away - but Wesley moved faster - and grabbed hold of him. The green demon pulled free and began to run - but once more Wesley caught him, tackling him to the ground. Lorne began to crawl away - under the counter - but Wes followed him. They knocked over Cordelia's desk in the ensuing scuffle. 'Doyle! Help!' Lorne cried out - but then Wesley punched him a few times, before grabbing a paper weight and knocking the demon unconscious with it.

...

Doyle appeared in the door to the office, holding the book, 'I got some o' the papers as well…' - he saw the disturbance, 'what happened?'

'He read me,' Wesley said, getting to his feet, 'Connor was fussing - and I sang to him - and he read me. He knows. We need to get him out of the way.'

'Let's drag him into your office.'

Between them, they manhandled the tall demon into Wes' office and then shut the door on him. Doyle then went to put Cordelia's desk straight. Wesley went to pick up Connor and his things again. He slung the diaper bag over his shoulder, and bundled the baby into his arms, 'here we go, here we go,' he murmured. He turned around - and saw Angel standing there. Cordelia was with him.

Doyle had also noticed the returned vampire. He was standing by Cordy's desk - frozen.

'Angel,' Wesley said - once more fighting to hold his nerve.

'Where is everybody?'

Doyle cleared his throat, 'uh - Fred and Gunn went for food - Lorne went out... to a gig, I think. We were watchin' the baby.'

'Yes - actually - I've packed some of his things,' Wes said. 'We talked about me taking Connor to the park - there's one across the road from my place. It's always full of kids … I thought he could spend the night with me.'

The two conspirators held their breath, whilst Angel thought about this. But then the vampire smiled. 'That's probably a really good idea.'

They both let out their breath. 'You want to say goodbye?' Wesley asked. He handed Connor to his father - for one last time.

Angel cradled his son in his arms - and held him tightly - smelling that baby smell - milk and talcum - and just holding it in. 'Sleep tight, big guy,' he gave him a kiss. 'Daddy'll see you real soon.'

Doyle found that he had to look away. He couldn't watch this … he felt tears prick at his eyes - this knowledge was a terrible thing. But Wesley remained stoic. Cordelia leaned over and tweaked Connor's nose, 'night night, champ,' she said, 'aren't you a big boy? Staying with your Uncle Wes.'

Doyle felt his gut twist with guilt - and the horrible jealousy he had sworn he didn't feel, as he looked at the three of them standing there like a family; the way they had the night Connor was born. He would never have to see this again. But he would have to witness Cordelia's grief - and Angel's - and forever hide the part he had played in it all.

'Just keep an eye on him,' Angel said to Wesley, 'I check on him a lot in the night. You got his paediatrician's number? His baby formula?'

'I've got all that.'

Fred and Gunn arrived back at the hotel - laden down with hoagies, 'who's ready to eat?' Fred asked, smiling.

'Fred's already had two,' Gunn grinned, 'but she's ready to eat another - so you better claim 'em fast.'

'You guys were quick,' Doyle said.

'We took a cab.'

'You know,' Wesley looked around at the ever more crowded lobby, 'Connor is getting sleepy. Why don't I take him now - and you can all have the evening to yourselves.'

Slowly, Angel relinquished Connor back into Wesley's grasp. The watcher looked around at everyone - at the lobby itself, memorising it all - his family, his home. 'Well I uh suppose I'll see you all tomorrow.' His eyes met Doyle's for one last time.

'Take care, man,' Doyle said. Wesley nodded and turned to leave.

'Hey Wes,' Angel called him back, 'what's the nearest emergency room to your place?'

There was half a beat - and then Wesley smiled and answered, 'Drew medical, one minute away. Top infant care centre. Don't worry.' He held Connor close, and hurried out of the door. Angel watched him go. So did Doyle. They both had heavy hearts - but for very different reasons.

...

'Well - my first whole night without the kid,' he wandered over to the bassinet and began to rearrange the toys in there. The others watched him. 'This'll be good for both of us,' the vampire decided. 'He can bond with his Uncle Wes - and I can get some rest.'

'We'll stay up with you,' Gunn offered, smiling.

Angel looked relieved. 'Really? Thanks.'

Cordelia crossed to him, and wrapped her arms around him, 'you'll get through this,' she said, 'it's just one night - and we'll all be here. The first time is always the hardest.'

'He's just still so little - but I'm sure he'll be…'

He was cut off by a moaning sound coming from the office. 'Is there someone in there?' Fred asked, peering towards it.

'I didn't hear anythin',' Doyle said quickly.

The moaning sound came again. But before they could go and investigate, the doors opened and Holtz marched in, followed by his army.

...

Angel glanced around the lobby - taking in all of Holtz's people, as they spread out and surrounded the little family. 'Won't you come in?' he said. He could afford to be polite - to wisecrack - the only thing that mattered had just been carried out of that door, safe in Wesley's arms, not two minutes ago. Connor was safe - The Powers must have been smiling down on them tonight with that timing - and so Holtz could threaten and swagger and have his makeshift mob of wannabe warriors go up in a skirmish against them all he wanted. Angel had real warriors on his side.

'How is fatherhood treating you?' The vampire hunter asked him - also courteous.

'I like it… you know, I met a friend of yours tonight. A demon named Sahjahn?'

Holtz raised an eyebrow, as he slowly came down the steps and into the centre of the lobby. 'What did he have to say?'

'He was cryptic,' the vampire replied, then reconsidered, 'actually he was kind of long winded. I didn't quite get what his deal was. I wasn't paying that much attention to him.'

One of Holtz' men had moved over to the bassinet. He glanced into it - and then looked up at his boss, almost imperceptibly shaking his head.

'He hates me,' said Angel - still thinking about Sahjahn, 'do you know why?'

'I didn't think to ask,' the vampire hunter replied, sounding disinterested. 'So - where is the little nipper?'

Holtz' warriors edged closer to the team - raising their weapons. Cordelia eyed them warily, 'uh - Angel - shouldn't we…?'

But Angel shook his head, and kept his eyes on his old enemy. 'I'm afraid Connor had to go out - sorry - I'm sure he'd love to meet you.'

'No doubt he'll turn up,' Holtz replied. He glanced around the lobby of the hotel, taking in the high ceilings and the sweeping staircase, and the family - 'looks like you've made a nice life for yourself here.'

'Angel, man,' Doyle said, looking between the vampire and Holtz, 'fight - don't talk.'

'You know - I think Doyle's right,' Angel said to Holtz, 'unless you really didn't come here to fight? - I could put on some tea?'

Doyle rolled his eyes. But Holtz took the cue to start the violence. 'I want Angelus alive - but not well,' he told his fighters.

The fighters launched their attack - and the team leapt into action. Gunn swung his fist at one man, whilst Angel picked another up and hurled him, bodily, across the room. The man smashed into the weapons cabinet - shattering the glass - and then fell to the floor in a heap. Cordelia ducked the sword swing of one of the fighters and then rolled herself over to the broken weapons cabinet - where she grabbed a sword of her own. She then did exactly as Angel had taught her in training, moving the line - making her opponent keep adjusting - blocking his sword swings - and then moving the line again. She moved with a natural grace, and her own blows were far more controlled. She was much better trained than the man she was fighting.

Doyle had been punched in the face by another of the men. The blow was hard, and he had staggered backwards - but he had recovered quickly, and then turned to demon face to protect himself. The fighter took a step back when he saw the vicious spikes burst out - and the little man's skin turn green. Doyle grabbed him by the shirt front and then rammed his spikes home in a head butt. The man howled and fell to the floor, and the Irishman turned to look for the next opponent.

Angel had got his own broadsword by now, and had thrown their sharpened baseball bat to Gunn. Both warriors were fighting hard - but only to fend off their enemies' weapons. They fought to disable, not to kill.

Doyle looked for Cordelia - and saw her still locked in combat with her sword wielding opponent. She was doing well - more than holding her ground - she was driving the man back towards the door. But she hadn't seen that another fighter was sneaking up on her - his own weapon raised, and ready to do some damage from behind. With a snarl of rage, Doyle leapt across the room - using his demon abilities to propel him far further than any ordinary man could ever hope to jump.

He didn't use his brachen powers very often - he still didn't like having them. He didn't mind using the spikes to gore the occasional enemy, but that was quick - and no one really saw. Super-jumping across the room - whilst fully green - was a bit more noticeable though; and he hated people to see what he could do - what he really was. But if Cordy was in danger - there was no way he wouldn't use every weapon in his arsenal to protect her.

He flew across the room and landed, heavily, on the man - just as he was about to strike his killing blow against Cordelia. The man fell to the ground - with Doyle still on top of him - and his weapon clattered out of his hand. Again, the Irishman grabbed his opponent by the shirt front and headbutted him as hard as he could. The man fell back, screaming, and then Doyle began to hit him - over and over again - beating him until he fell unconscious.

Angel swung his broadsword and knocked the weapon from one man's hand. The man then pulled out a stake and raised it kill the vampire. He was stopped when a crossbow bolt hit him in the back. Fred nodded to herself, grimly, satisfied she had saved Angel's life - and then began to reload her weapon. But as she did, she was tackled to the floor by yet another fighter. She used the crossbow as a blunt instrument to beat at the man attacking her.

As Gunn was forced back towards Wesley's office by two of Holtz' men, a green hand appeared on top of Wesley's desk. Lorne levered himself back into a standing position, still groaning as his head pounded from the beating he had taken. He saw Gunn down on the floor - fighting upwards against the onslaught - and immediately let out a long, loud, high pitched note. The people in the office fell to the ground, clutching their ears, and Lorne kicked one of the fighters in his face. Gunn scrabbled back to his feet - and knocked the other one out.

Holtz watched the fray - saw his fighters being taken down by the smaller group - and then turned and walked quietly out of the hotel. Angel threw the last guy over the counter and then turned to see his old enemy walking away. He went over to Fred and pulled the guy off her, and helped her up to her feet.

...

Caught between both Doyle and Cordy - and realising Holtz had left - the man with the sword cut his losses and fled. The group all looked around at each other, weary and breathing heavily after their fight. 'Why'd Holtz give up?' Cordelia asked, 'I thought he was a fight to the last man standing, death or glory kinda dude?'

Doyle stared at the doorway, and bit his lip - his insides were churning away with guilt and fear, worrying what would happen next. 'He doesn't wanna fight to his own death,' he said to his girlfriend, 'only Angel's - if he dies before Angel does, then everything he did - making a pact with a demon, travellin' through time - it was all for nothin'. He's thinkin' o' the bigger picture.' He turned to the vampire, 'so what do we do now?'

'We need to call Wesley - warn him. Fred can you do that?'

She made her way to the phone.

'I'll do it,' Doyle said, quickly. Too quickly. People would have noticed something was up... but they were too distracted. He grabbed the phone before Fred could. The woman looked surprised, but just shrugged and backed off. The half demon started to dial. He didn't imagine for a minute that his fleeing comrade would answer…


	60. Sleep Tight: Part Four

Wesley frowned, as he heard his cell begin to ring. He really thought it would be a bit longer before Angel checked up on him … he had hoped to have tossed the phone and left the city before he got his first call from the vampire, wanting to know how his son was doing. He fished the cell from his pocket - intending to throw it away, but then noticed that the call was coming from the line hooked up to Doyle's desk.

He hesitated. It might be a coincidence. Angel might just be using the nearest phone. But it also might be Doyle - and the Irishman would not be ringing unless it was something important. Well, if it was Angel - he would just have to lie. It was better that he spoke to the vampire now - assuaged his doubts - rather than ignored him and allow his fears to fester. That would only tip him off something was wrong. When it came to Connor - Angel was a panicker.

He flicked the cell open, 'hello?'

* * *

'Wesley!' Doyle sounded surprised to have contacted him, 'listen, man, there's something I gotta tell y'...'

...

Lorne stumbled out of the office - all bruised and battered. Angel looked him up and down. 'Jeez Lorne, they got you good. You better sit down.'

...

'Yeah - we've just been attacked by Holtz, he was lookin' for Connor. You gotta be careful...' Doyle said into the phone.

...

Lorne just looked at Angel, his face dark. The vampire looked confused, 'what?'

'They didn't do this to me - Wesley did.'

There was a moment of stunned silence, as everyone stared at the Green demon. Doyle trailed off from speaking - and held the receiver limply in his right hand. He was hardly breathing - and he felt sick with dread. The truth was about to come out - far sooner than they had hoped.

'Wesley?... what are you on about?' Angel asked.

Lorne sighed, and slumped himself down on the sofa. 'Earlier - when he came to pick up the baby. Connor was crying - and he sang to him. I read him … I don't know why he did it.'

'Did what?'

...

Doyle was completely still now - his mouth slightly open - and his eyes frozen in place, just staring at the demon that was spilling out all their secrets.

...

'He's been to see Holtz behind your back - twice. He isn't taking the baby away over night - he's taking him away - for good.'

...

Doyle let out his breath, a deep, ragged wheeze, and closed his eyes - feeling dread and defeat crash over him all at once. They would be caught. Angel would get Connor back - the baby would still be in danger, and Cordelia - Cordelia would know what he had done. She would never forgive him. In another hour - two at most - he would have lost her, lost everything. 'Gotta go,' he said into the phone, ' _now_.' He hoped that Wesley would realise that those words were aimed as an instruction at himself, and not simply the half demon saying goodbye. He slammed the phone down.

* * *

Wesley hurried out of his apartment building. He held Connor in his right arm, and carried a suitcase in his left. He struggled to aim his keys at his car, as he kept the baby held close; but after a moment there was a chirp of sound, and the headlights flashed, as his car unlocked itself remotely.

Carefully, he opened the back door and strapped Connor into his baby seat. He closed up the door and then put his suitcase into the trunk. Then he went round to the driver's side. As he opened up his door, he heard a groaning sound. Straightening up, he turned around and peered into the dark - looking for the source of the noise. He pulled his gun out. 'That's quite close enough, thank you.'

Justine stumbled into view, she fell to her knees and looked up at him, Her face was bloody and bruised, and she was clutching her midsection tightly - as if nursing a wound.

'Justine?'

'He's everything you said - it's true.'

Wesley frowned - he kept the gun trained on the woman, 'what happened?'

'Well,' she let out a laugh, 'he didn't keep his word.' She struggled back to her feet and stumbled closer.

'I said that's close enough,' he said to her. Doyle had warned him to be careful - and he was heeding that advice. He wasn't going to let Holtz' deputy get too near to him - not when Holtz had already sprung one trap that evening.

'He took everyone and went for the baby,' she told the watcher, 'and when I questioned him…'

Wesley cocked his head to one side. 'Why did you question him?'

'What?' she gasped for breath, sounding in pain.

'Why did you question him - you are his loyal deputy - are you not?'

'He .. said he would give you one day .. he said...'

'And I never trusted him, and I don't trust you. You would follow Holtz into the gates of hell, itself, to kill vampires - isn't that what you said? You expect me to believe this change of heart?'

She stared at him - he was supposed to be helping her. She was injured - at the hands of Holtz - why wouldn't he believe that she had changed her mind?

'I have spoken to my people at the hotel,' he told her - answering her unasked question. 'I know what has happened. It changes nothing. Now I suggest - if you are hurt as badly as you are making out - you get to a hospital.'

Her plan had failed. She had failed Holtz. Somehow this effete Brit had got the jump on them - known about the attack on the hotel. He couldn't possibly have known. Wesley smirked, as he saw the rage on her face. 'You can't possibly have thought I was planning this kidnap all by myself?' he said to her, 'I still have a man on the inside - I still know what is going on with my family, even if I can no longer be with them. Goodbye Justine.'

He turned to get back in the car, and with a snarl she launched at him - a small blade in her hand. He whipped around, as he heard her coming and - without a moment's hesitation fired his gun. He shot her just below the kneecap and she fell to the floor - screaming in agony. 'Goodbye Justine,' he repeated, and he climbed into his car - locked the doors - and drove away.

* * *

'That doesn't make any sense,' Gunn said, 'you must have read him wrong. But Lorne pointed to the gash on his head as proof that he had read him right.

Angel looked across at Doyle, standing by the phone, 'did you get hold of him?' where is he?'

'Uh - he just… I hung up before..before I heard what Lorne said... I warned him - I thought he was just at home.'

'Ring him back!' Angel snarled. Doyle began to redial - knowing this time that Wesley would not answer - that with any luck the watcher would now be well away from his phone, driving out of the city. He tried his landline first - thinking that was the one Wesley was least likely to answer - he was desperately stalling for time, whilst hoping that he looked like he was being useful.

Fred was frowning at him, though … she couldn't prove it - she hadn't been paying that close attention… but she was sure the half demon had still been on the phone when Lorne had come stumbling out of the office...

One of Holtz' downed fighters was pulling himself along the floor, inch by inch, his hand pressed into his side, where Fred had shot him. Lorne frowned down at him, 'shouldn't we be getting these guys to a hospital - or a morgue?'

'No,' Angel said, hauling the fighter to his feet, 'Holtz knew Connor wasn't here when he arrived. Otherwise he would have torn the place apart from top to bottom looking for him. He was stalling.'

'Buying Wesley time to get away,' Lorne concluded.

Doyle hung up the phone, 'no answer at home - or on his cell or pager. Wes has gone.'

The green demon turned to look at him, 'are you sure about that?' he asked, 'are you sure you tried _everything_ you could to stop him and bring him back?'

Doyle felt his stomach jolt - like he had just missed his footing on a step in the dark. The way Lorne was looking at him… the anagogic demon knew … something. He knew Doyle was involved somehow. He must have seen it when he read Wesley. Or maybe he realised Wes couldn't have manhandled him into the office by himself - and there had only been one other person at the hotel to help.

The Irishman took some deep breaths - and looked the Host dead in the eye, 'I did everything I could,' he replied. He mustn't know the full story, Doyle realised, if he did he would have told the others. But he knew enough to make him a danger - a threat - Doyle was going to have to be very wary around Lorne in future.

...

Angel slammed the fighter against the wall, 'Holtz is the key,' he said, 'I want Holtz. If I find Wesley with him…'

Gunn stepped up, 'Angel we don't know the full story here, I don't think you should get too pumped….'

'Hello! They've kidnapped Connor!' Cordelia said, 'now is exactly the time to get pumped - Angel - torture him.' She nodded her head towards the fighter. The vampire turned and slammed the man again. The man groaned.

'Look - I know this is life and death, I'm just sayin'...' Gunn tried to be the voice of reason - but reason had left the hotel along with Connor. Angel dropped the man and instead grabbed Gunn by the shirt, 'he took my son!' he yelled into his face, and then flung the street fighter away from himself.

'You better get your damn hands off me!' Gunn squared up to the vampire.

'Stop it - stop it both of you!' Fred cried, getting in between them. Doyle made his way out from behind the counter, looking between his two sparring friends. He needed to keep this going. He needed to give Wes time to get far enough away that Angel couldn't track him … but he had to be clever about it. Lorne was already suspicious.

'There is only one thing that matters right now,' Fred was saying, 'where is Connor?'

'Do we really think Wes would hand him over to Holtz?' Cordelia asked - she sounded doubtful.

'I think we need to decide who's the bigger threat to Connor right now - Wes or Holtz?' Doyle said. Cordelia nodded - that made sense. 'Now if Wes has given Connor to Holtz - and I'm not sayin' he has - then we need to find Holtz. But if Wes has kept Connor for himself… then he'll do whatever it takes to protect the baby. We gotta stop Holtz from trackin' him down. We got plenty o' time to look for Wes once there aren't people tryin' to kill us.'

'I think Doyle's right,' Cordelia agreed, 'torture that guy - let's find Holtz.'

Doyle breathed a sigh of relief. Cordy agreed with him - which meant Angel would do as he had suggested - waste time chasing down Holtz, allowing Wesley the opportunity to flee the State.

Angel turned back to the man. 'Where is he?'

'You think I'd tell…'

The vampire threw the man right across the lobby - and grabbed the next one. He pushed him against the wall and pulled the crossbow bolt from out of his side. 'I'm gonna count to three and then I'm gonna bury this in your face.'

Cordelia nodded, approvingly.

'Twenty two thirty nine St. Elena. It's a big Victorian in Silverlake.'

Angel dropped the man and ran out of the door. The others watched him go. 'We better find Wesley before he does,' Fred said.

'We should start at his place,' Gunn suggested.

Doyle nodded, 'you guys - go to Wes' see if y' can find him,' he was reasonably sure that Wes would be long gone by the time they got there, 'me and Cordy will go after Angel - help him with Holtz.'

Lorne gave him another long stare. Doyle met his eyes and stared right back - challenging him to say anything. There was a danger - a menace - to the expression of the half demon that the Host had never seen there before. The green demon shook his head and dropped eye contact - and the Irishman knew he was safe - for now. 'I'll stay here, in case Wes comes back,' Lorne said. Though he knew the watcher would not be walking back through those doors. He knew what he had read.

* * *

A group of paramilitaries stood outside Holtz' mansion - holding their submachine guns ready. A black car pulled up, and one of the uniformed men opened the passenger door. Lilah stepped out. 'What do we know?'

'No Holtz - no baby,' the commander told her. He pointed to a couple of men that they held bound and gagged along the wall, 'a couple of stragglers from the attack on Angel's hotel They don't know where Holtz went.'

'So we're in the right place then?'

'Yes, Ma'am - but Holtz never came back here after the hotel.'

Lilah looked annoyed. 'So where did he go?'

* * *

The Plymouth roared down the street, Doyle was at the wheel. 'If we hurry we can get to the mansion at the same time as Angel does,' he yelled over the sound of the engine. The vampire had taken the roofs - he could move faster above the city, than he could down in the streets - trapped in the traffic.

'Then what?' Cordelia called back to him. Her short hair was streaming out behind her in the wind.

'We help him.'

'What if Wesley's there?' Cordelia asked.

Doyle gripped the steering wheel tighter - his knuckles turned white - and he kept his eyes fixed on the road, ahead, as he answered. 'He won't be there.'

'What about Connor?'

There was a moment of quiet, whilst Doyle contemplated the possibility of defeat. 'I don't know,' he said.

* * *

'We're picking him up again,' the commando said, pressing his earpiece harder into his ear, as he listened to the information being relayed to him across the radiowaves. 'Just a moment - Spring Street.'

'Downtown,' said Lilah.

'Yes ma'am - near the sixth street bridge.'

'Let's go.'

They commandos all ran for their humvees. As one of the commandos passed a tree, he was suddenly yanked backwards. Angel stepped out from behind the tree and smashed the man into a post, knocking him out. The driver of the vehicle waited for his partner to get in the car - and when he didn't seem to be coming leaned over to peer out of the passenger window to see what was happening. Angel ripped the driver's door open and pulled the driver out.

As he did, there was a squeal of tyres behind him - but he didn't turn to see what was there. He threw the commando out into the road and then got in behind the wheel. The back doors opened, as he shut his own, and Cordy and Doyle tumbled into the back seat. Angel drove off following the other humvees - he glanced in the mirror to look at his backseat passengers. 'What are you guys doing here?'

* * *

Holtz stood alone by the sixth street bridge. He checked his watch. Justine should be here by now - with the child. If she left it much later … he heard the sound of a car approaching, and smiled to himself. Ah - here she was. He shouldn't have doubted.

But his smile turned into a frown of concern, as the car engine was joined by the sound of another and then another - and then suddenly the vampire hunter found himself surrounded by the humvees, all squealing to a halt and blocking him in.

The commandos all burst out of their cars and surrounded the vampire hunter, pointing their submachine guns at him. He stared them down - an expression of mild surprise on his face. 'Who are you?'

'They work for me,' Lilah said, getting out of her own car and walking towards him.

'Ah - the attorney,' Holtz said.

Lilah nodded. 'Where's the baby, Holtz?'

'That's what I'd like to know.' The commandos all turned their guns on this new voice - it was Angel - of course. Cordelia and Doyle, who were behind him, raised their hands in surrender, immediately. But Angel didn't. Bullets couldn't kill him.

Holtz chuckled, 'my, my - it appears we are all looking for the same thing. And none of us know what has happened.'

'A word to the wise, Holtz,' Lilah said, 'these guns pointing at you are automatic weapons. They didn't have those in your day. They fire sixteen bullets per second. So just hand over the damn kid.'

The vampire hunter did not seem impressed by her threats. He spread his arms wide, 'do I look like I am hiding a child? I sent my person to retrieve the baby half an hour ago - I am beginning to worry about her.'

'To retrieve the baby from Wesley?' Angel asked - but it came out as a snarl, as he thought about the betrayal.

'Angel… no…' Doyle started to say, but he was cut off by Holtz.

'Yes exactly, Angelus. But it seems Mr. Wyndam Pryce has double crossed us both.'

' _No_ ,' Doyle said, again. But Angel wasn't listening to him.

'He has taken the child himself - I fear - and who knows where to?'

'That doesn't make sense,' Cordelia cried, 'why would Wesley make a deal with you? Why would he take the baby away?' Her voice was hurt and angry.

'Mr. Wyndam Pryce is a member of the Watcher's Council of England, is he not?' Holtz asked, 'I believe they hate vampires almost as much as I do. Perhaps he has taken the child back to that fine institution - I imagine they would be very interested in the miracle child of two vampires, and one with a soul no less.'

'Aren't we all?' Lilah said, sounding annoyed, she motioned to her commandos, 'the baby isn't here - pack up the operation, regroup at base.' The paramilitaries began to pull back. Lilah turned on her heel - smirking at the three team members, as she went past, 'who knew old Wes had this in him?' she asked, rhetorically. But she was stopped in her tracks by the air shimmering - and Sahjahn materialising in front of her.

'You lost the baby?' he roared, 'all of you?'

' _You,_ ' Angel said in disbelief.

'I bring a vampire hunter, who has sworn blood vengeance, through 250 years worth of time - and he fails me? I co-opt the firm that spreads evil tentacles across all dimensions to finish the job - and they fail me? They get defeated by some guy who's _good with a book?_ '

'Yeah yeah - it's a bitch - but what are you gonna do?' Lilah was smiling her shark's smile again, 'you're impotent in this dimension. You can't do a thing to us.'

'You're gonna find that baby for me,' Sahjahn threatened, 'because if you don't …' he suddenly began to chant ' _lekko najine forkahdio,'_ the air distorted - and then it was like the atmosphere was being ripped at the seams - and a tear opened up in the sky - right in front of them. Everyone took a step back. Doyle wrapped his arms around Cordy, holding onto her.

'Behold Quortoth,' Sahjahn said, 'the darkest of all dark worlds. You cannot begin to imagine this world - the horror - if hell is a living place, then Quortoth is hell. Find the vampire's child - or I will have you swallowed up into a world your wildest nightmares could not even begin to conceive of.'

Doyle clung to Cordelia even tighter.

'I want that child,' Sahjahn said, 'I give you all exactly two months - sixty days - and then Quortoth awaits for those who have failed me. Not so impotent, now, huh? _Forkahdio najine lekko_.' He chanted his incantation in reverse - and the tear healed up, and the window into hell went way. 'Two months,' he said again, and then vanished into the ether.

Lilah snorted, unimpressed, 'what a drama queen - tonight has been a total bust.' She went back to her car and drove away, leaving the three team members alone with Holtz.

'You really don't have him?' Angel asked, 'or know where he is?'

'I am just as annoyed as you are, Angelus,' Holtz replied - calmly, 'but the child is as lost to me as it is to you. It is your own Mr. Wyndam Pryce that you need to be hunting down.' He turned to leave, but then glanced back, 'my vengeance is not yet achieved, Angelus, do be warned.' He walked off. Angel was barely listening to him.

The vampire stared down the road, out into the night - his face bewildered - and desperate. Cordelia left Doyle's embrace, to go and wrap her arms around Angel. Doyle watched her hold him, tightly, being there for him in his time of need. Even with Connor taken away - the pair of them still looked like a family.

'We'll find him, Angel,' she whispered, 'you'll see.'

Angel still stared into the night - he had not even heard her words, or felt her arms about him. His son was lost - his best friend had betrayed him and his child had been stolen. The whole world was desolate and empty. 'Connor,' he whispered.

* * *

It was the early hours of the morning when Wesley drove over the state line. The sun was just beginning to rise, as he came off the Interstate, in Arizona, and took Route 60. He drove to a town called 'Hope' - and there he pulled into a motel, and took Connor inside. They had made it...


End file.
